Request for microbial inoculant samples for UQ scoping study

The University of Queensland, in collaboration with Metagen Australia and Fertilizer Australia is calling for growers, agronomists, re sellers and the wider agricultural community to provide microbial inoculants for testing as part of a student project. We are interested in obtaining products that contain defined species of live microbes, ideally with some measure of concentration such as CFU/ml/g, cells/ml/g, spores/ml/g or similar.

The aim of this student project is to determine how often these types of products contain what is written on the label and to determine if they contain any significant contamination. The methods followed include:

• The identity of products and product manufactures will be double blinded to ensure there is no possibility for bias or conflict of interest.
• CFU counting will be done with biological replicates in triplicate. The type of agar used, and growth conditions may vary depending on the types of microbial products being tested. A general guide for how CFU counting will be done can be found here: https://www.eppendorf.com/au-en/beyond-science/method-applications/microbiology/how-to-quantify-bacterial-cultures/
• DNA will be extracted from microbial products and amplicon sequencing will be performed to characterise microbes in products when they can’t be cultured using standard agar and CFU counting. Since DNA can be detected from non-viable microorganisms this will help us understand if the product is contaminated or simply non-viable. This may also be done in the circumstance that CFU counts fail to match up with what is reported on the label of products. This will be done by Metagen Australia.
• Manufactures of products which return poor results will be contacted and offered the chance to send in new samples for retesting.
• Results of tested products will not be made publicly available however individuals who submit products will be made aware the results of the specific products they submitted so that they may have confidence using or selling them.

For product submissions or project enquiries please contact:

Dr Ben Evert, ben@metagen.com.au 0450541942
Dr Sundar Kalaipandian, s.kalaipandian@uq.edu.au
Rohit Krishna r.valavadibalachandran@student.uq.edu.au
Jeff Kraak, jeff.kraak@fertilizer.org.au

This article appears as part of the 3 March 2025 issue of Guacamole.

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