High throughput growth screening of the marine bacterium Ruegeria pomeroyi DSS-3 knockout mutants on 70 environmentally relevant marine substrates done in 2021.

An array of transporter knockout mutants of the marine bacterium Ruegeria pomeroyi DSS-3 mutants were screened for growth on 70 environmentally relevant marine substrates. The array contains 156 isolated knockout mutants of putative transporter genes as well as positive and negative growth controls and is distributed across two 96-well plates. Actively growing cultures were inoculated into freshly prepared 96 well plates containing minimal medium with a single substrates as sole carbon source. Plates were grown for 24 to 96 hours with growth monitored by optical density at 600 nm. Mutants that demonstrated growth defects on a given substrate, relative to typical growth on that substrate were selected for higher resolution follow up testing.