Antibiotics are the medications that destroy or slow down the growth of other microorganisms specially bacteria. Each gram of soil may contain approximately 1000 different bacterial species. Many could be capable of producing metabolites that can be use as antibiotics or antimicrobials. When bacteria develop the ability to defeat these antibiotics designed to kill them they become resistant, the most urgent threats to public’s health. Influenced by the crowd sourcing initiative of Tiny Earth® we aims to look for possible antibiotic producer strains of bacteria or fungi from the dry land soil. Current study is a baseline study that discusses the results obtained from soil samples collected at different sites within Navajo Reservations, Arizona near Tuba City, Moenave, Rare metals, and Moencopi Wash. There were three goals we targeted in this baseline study i.e. collection of soil samples in Tuba City and surrounding areas, isolation and identification of soil-derived bacteria, and look for antagonistic activity against test strain of ESBL negative Klebsiella pneumoniae. Out of a total of 104 selected colonies, only nine (09) gram positive bacterial colonies (rod; spore former), were identified as producer strains against ESBL negative test strain of Klebsiella pneumoniae. In next stage of the study, we are going to test the crude extracellular extract of these 09 strains against ESKAPE safe relatives (Enterococcus raffinosus, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Escherichia coli, Acinetobacter baylyi, Pseudomonas putida and Enterobacter aerogenes). Furthermore, with any positive antibacterial activity, the crude extract will be purified using various chemical methods and the bacterial strains will be identified using 16S ribosomal RNA genotyping.

Keywords : Dry Land Soil, ESKAPE Pathogens, Antimicrobials, 16S Ribosomal RNA