Liquid vs. Plate mutation accumulation experiment

This study considers the execution of a mutation accuulation (MA)experiment in liquid culture instead of on agar plates. The mutation accumulation experiment has been used to estimate mutation rates for decades, in particular since the advent of high-throughput sequencing. However, these experiments in bacteria are limited to those strains which can grow on agar plates. It is becoming more apparent with time, that there are many bacterial strains that do not grow well on agar plates of any sort. These bacteria include some of those which inhabit the human urinary tract, some cyanobacteria, some strains grown in laboratories in long-term evolution experiments, and likely many more that are as yet unknown. This study demonstrates the efficacy of the liquid MA by serial dilution to the point of single-cell bottlenecks, using techniques and lab supplies which are common to research labs.