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Topics - houdinihar

#1
Cultivation / microwave liquid agar preparation
October 19, 2008, 11:38:12 AM
hello fellow mushroom enthusiasts,
just wanted to update friends here about the microwave tek for agar (pda or mea). i recently did a search for this subject and found that a U.S. College in Texas did a study and found that microwaving liquid agar preps is just as effective against multiple microbes and spores as is autoclaving or pressure cooking like we usually do. the hardest bug to kill was e. coli, which took only 60 secs on high. period.
i tried the tek myself and found that it works just as published. i mixed the malt extract agar as instructed in a glass pyrex measuring cup, 1 gram per 25 ml warm water. put in just a slight bit extra for evaporation during the nuking process. the water has to be a bit warm just to dissolve the agar well.
after the agar was dissolved in the water i nuked everything for 1 minute and 25 secs and stirred with a little spoon a couple of times. i have a 1500 watt microwave, but the college tested a 650 watt version. you have to be careful not to allow the agar to boil over if the container is too small. it will make a terrible, sticky mess. after that i took the pyrex cup with the agar preparation over to my cheapo "glove box" for transfer to sterile petri dishes. i have recently transferred blue oyster, yellow oyster, and volvariella spp to these plates with no obvious contamination from the agar on the plates. i have several petri dishes left from several days ago with no contaminants seen. this tek does work and saves so much time.
houdinihar