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THE ACTINOMYCETES, Vol. II 



Gelatin: Sediment buff-colored. Liquefac- 

 tion medium. 



Tyrosinase reaction: Positive. 



Nitrate reduction: None. 



Carbon sources: Sugars readily utilized, 

 with the exception of acetate, benzoate, 

 cellulose, dulcitol, /-inositol, and salicylate. 



Antagonistic properties: Active primarily 

 upon gram-negative bacteria and fungi. 



Remarks: Closely related to S. antibi- 

 oticus. 



39. Streptomyces calif amicus (Waksman 

 and Curtis, 1916) Waksman and Henrici 

 (Waksman, S. A. and Curtis, R. E. Soil Sci. 

 1: 22, 1916; Waksman, S. A. ibid. 8: 104, 

 1919). 

 Synonyms: 



Streptomyces puniceus Finlay and Sobin, 

 1950. 



Streptomyces vinaceus Mayer et al., 

 1951. 



Streptomyces floridae Bartz et ed., 1951. 

 Streptomyces griseus var. purpureus 

 Burkholder et al, 1955. 

 Streptomyces purpureus (Burkholder, 

 1955) Waksman, 1959. 

 Morphology: The original culture was re- 

 ported to form sporophores with long, nar- 

 row, open sinistrorse spirals. According to 

 Okami, however, the sporophores are 

 straight. Recent examinations of the original 

 culture of Waksman and Curtis (Burkholder 

 et al., 1955) did not reveal any spirals either. 

 Sucrose nitrate agar: Growth spreading, 

 vinaceous-colored. Aerial mycelium 



powdery, light neutral gray to ash-gray. No 

 soluble pigment. 



Glucose-asparagine agar: Growth re- 

 stricted, much folded, cream-colored, with 

 sulfur-yellow tinge. 



Nutrient agar: Growth thin, restricted, 

 yellowish to cream-colored, Melanin-nega- 

 tive. 



Starch agar: Growth spreading, pink 

 center with colorless to gray margin. Hy- 

 drolysis rapid. 



Potato: Growth glossy, yellow to red, 

 turning red-brown. 



Gelatin: Growth gray, moist, abundant. 

 No soluble pigment. Liquefaction medium. 



Milk: Surface growth faint, brownish. 

 Coagulation and slow peptonization. 



Nitrate reduction: Positive. 



Production of H 2 S: Negative. 



Cellulose: Growth scant but definite. 



Carbon utilization: According to Burk- 

 holder, the various strains utilize D-xylose, 

 n-glucose, D-galactose, D-fructose, cellobiose, 

 n-maltose, D-mannitol, and starch. Growth 

 poor with L-arabinose, L-rhamnose, D-lac- 

 tose, sucrose, D-raffinose, dulcitol, /-inositol, 

 and salicin. 



Temperature: Optimum 37°C. 



Invertase: Positive. 



Antagonistic properties: Routien and 

 Hofmann (1951) first demonstrated that 

 cultures of S. californicus are capable of 

 producing viomycin. The same antibiotic 

 was found to be produced by other strains 

 of this organism. 



Habitat: Soil. 



Remarks: Waksman and Curtis reported 

 the production of spirals in their original 

 description of *S. californicus (see also Waks- 

 man, 1919). Several authors who studied 

 the S. californicus culture more recently de- 

 scribed the aerial mycelium as straight to 

 wavy to strongly flexuous (Burkholder et a I.. 

 1955; Kutzner, 1956; Ktt linger et al., 1958). 

 Since the other properties of the now-avail- 

 able S. californicus lit with the original de- 

 scription, it might be assumed that the 

 strongly flexuous aerial hyphae were con- 

 sidered as spirals originally. In 1955 Burk- 

 holder et al. made a comparative study of 

 several viomycin-producing organisms which 

 were originally described under the names 

 S. floridae, S. puniceus, S. vinaceus, S. cali- 

 fornicus, and several others. All these cul- 

 tures behaved in a similar manner, with 

 only minor differences between this group 

 and N. californicus ATCC 3312; namely. 



