PCR-based Identification of Microorganisms in a Kefir Grain

Nowadays many people are concerned about being healthy, and many dairy products are taken as health supplementary foods. Among dairy products, kefir, also called as Tibet mushroom, is a yogurt fermented by kefir grain, which is a mixture of lactic acid bacteria and yeasts. Although there are many empirical evidences that kefir is very influential for human body, the exact reason is not definitively discovered. Therefore, it would be useful to understand characteristics of a kefir grain and to categorize bacteria in a kefir grain. In this paper, molecular biological apparatus such as PCR, electrophoresis, PCR purification, DNA sequencing were used to identify and classify the species of lactic acid bacteria and yeast in a kefir grain. We used PCR-based identification method using 16S rRNA primer and Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) primer. We identified 6 different species which were selected on different medium. In addition, observation with scanning electron microscope (SEM) enabled us to grasp an external shape of the kefir grain. Although we found a limited number of microbial species, more intensive research are needed for extensive identification of microorganism species in Korean kefir grain.