Isolation and characterization of Dietzia maris from midgut of Aedes albopictus: A suitable candidate for paratransgenesis

The genus Dietzia is remarkably similar to genus Rhodococcus. Bacterial species Rhodococcus rhodnii of genus Rhodococcus was used for genetically modification for expression of potent antimicrobial molecules which shows strong deleterious effect against Trypanosoma cruzi. Hence, Dietzia maris can be a suitable candidate for genetic modification for expression of effector molecules against the parasite like dengue and chikungunya in the mosquitoe’s midgut as was possible in R. rhodnii. In this study the D. maris was isolated for the first time from mosquitoes Aedes albopictus collected from Arunachal Pradesh, North East India. After purification bacteria was first morphologically and biochemically characterized which showed high salt tolerance and exhibited slow growth rate appearing on agar plate after 48-72hr. The isolated bacterial species was finally conformed as a D. maris on the basis of results obtained from MALDI-TOF MS and 16S rRNA gene based analysis.