Screening and Isolation of Marine Bacteria with Biological Activity from Oil Contaminated Sea Water

Screening of marine bacteria isolated from the surface of marine algae and invertebrates has shown that a high percentage produce antimicrobial metabolites (Bergess et al., 1999). The first antibiotic from marine bacterium was identified and characterized in 1966 (Burkholder et al., 1966). In addition, bacteria in bio films formed on the surface of marine organisms have been documented to contain a high proportion of antibiotic producing bacteria than some other marine environment (Lemos et al., 1985; Anand et al., 2006). A number of surface associated marine bacteria have also been found to produce antibiotics (Holmstrom and Kjelleberg 1999; Hans et al., 2004).