BACKGROUND OF STUDY

Background of the Study

            Because of the rising threats of increasing pathogenecity of modern bacterial strains, the need for close vision of these organisms has also increased. Laboratories need to culture bacteria in order for them to identify colonies, the reason being for the illness of a certain person. To artificially allow the multiplication of microorganisms, certain requirements must be met and keen adherence and considerations must be noted.

Besides considering the different environmental factors, another factor to be aware of is the culture medium. Culture media are solutions containing all of the nutrients and physical growth parameters necessary for microbial growth.

As stated in a literature that in making a culture media we consider the required ingredients of culture media such as water, agar, peptone, casein hydrolysate, meat extract, and yeast extract and malt extract to produce an. environment could provide the needed environmental and nutritional setting for them to develop in it. (http: //www.microrao.com/micronotes/culture_media.pdf)

  One of the commonly used culture medium is agar, which is a solid medium that allows bacteria to grow. This solid medium is useful for isolating bacteria or for determining the characteristics of colonies that would also help in determining treatments for certain diseases. However, the downside in using agar as synthetic culture media is its affordability. This is the root reason why we came up with this research paper; to find ways on how to economize laboratory expenses and a way to it is by looking for a substitute of agar as a culture medium. 
So as we had a further research in finding the means we came about a study that made mention of using beef as a good source of protein in culturing the bacteria: Beef extract is a good source of protein knowing the fact that it is the major component in the composition of muscles, hair, tendons and the physiologic parts of the body; this is the reason why microorganisms efficiently grow in a beef extract. (http: //www.exercise.com/article/nutrition-basics-protein-the-building-blocks-of-lean-muscle).

As we had a through finding more feasible source of protein there was another study who made mention of the possible use of Golden apple snails proteins’ as culture media.As stated in Snails are known t be good sources of proteins because f the known fact that they are composed of 15% protein, 2.4% fat and about 80% water , which also makes them a viable source of food commodity for poor families.(http://housewifeatwork.blogspot.com/2008/01/ginataang-kuhol-or-snails.html)

But even with this possibility it was questioned that snails may not be a good source of such because it is also a vector of known parasites and they have caused problems in the rice fields leading them to be known as the major pests. As cited that, besides the circumstances that they could be possible source of pathogenic diseases, Golden Apple Snails have also been treated as major pests in the rice fields especially in the countries Philippines, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam, Due to the harm they have caused the agricultural fields, people have been using different means of eliminating them such as the use f poisons and traps.  (www.getridofthings.com)

In relation to this they have been doing all means to eliminate snails, but the downside to this is that it has shown bad effects on the environmental aspects. This has opened another idea that we could also make an effective way and much environment friendly elimination of such pests. Considering these facts, we could still use snails as means of source of protein, eliminating them at the same time too, knowing that they multiply fast and is very accessible.
As stated in a source, the reproducibility of the Golden apple snails is fast and multiplies twice a month, basically by two weeks time and at 25 degrees Celsius they hatch. And in looking at its nutritive values the medium sized snail contains protein, carbohydrates, phosphorus, sodium, potassium, riboflavin, and niacin. (www.bfar.da.gov.ph)

Now that we have found an effective source of protein in making our own culture medium, we have thought about which bacteria should we culture, looking through the possible pathogens we came up with the Escherichia coli. This bacteria is the most common and readily grows in a non selective media making it much easier to culture.
As stated in a source Escherichia coli which naturally lives in the gut that causes n harm when expsed t the external environment but may cause gastr intestinal diseases such as clitis and diarrhea , is a bacteria that grws in a non selective medium , in a temperature f 15-45 degrees Celsius. (Medical Microbiology, 2007)

This is how we came about our topic in finding less harmful means in eliminating Golden apple snails by using them proteins in making culture media instead of killing them with -chemicals, then culture a non-selective media E. Coli bacteria which could help us in line with our course too as Clinical laboratory scientists.