Where is Delftia?
Over the last several years, we have been enlisting citizen scientists to search for Delftia on the campus of North Carolina State University.
We have found D. acidovorans distributed throughout campus, most often in sink and shower drains.
We enlisted the help of students at NC State University to collect samples around campus and the surrounding area.
Students were instructed to
- Swab sinks, drains, and downspouts
- Label swabs with location (coordinates and description)
After sample collection, qPCR* was used to detect and quantify the presence of D. acidovorans.
- New England BioLabs Luna qPCR reagents
- Double quenched primers specific for Delftia
Following detection, we used Sanger Sequencing to answer how different are Delftia genomes?
*Riley et al. 2020.
Future studies: Test Delftia samples collected from bathrooms. This may increase the yield of Delftia DNA that can be used for metagenomic studies. Sequence variations of the gold gene could be compared to improve our understanding.
What microbes live alongside Delftia? What else can we learn about Delftia?