Water Contamination Lab Report

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The Presence of Fecal Contamination in Nearby Water Samples. Brittany Stamper 03/21/2015 The University of Southern Mississippi The Presence of Fecal Contamination in Nearby Water Samples. Abstract The presence of coliforms in a water supply can mean there is fecal contamination circulating in that water, which we tested for in this experiment. It is hypothesized that all of the water supplies will exhibit the presence of fecal coliforms, because they are all outside sources of water that have road runoff, sewage waste and animals defecating in them. We gathered several water samples and inoculated lactose broth with these water samples which tested for fermentation and helped determine if coliforms were present. Then if there was possible coliforms present, we placed them on either an Endo agar …show more content…

We observed the agar plate for colonies that had a metallic look, because these were likely E.coli colonies. We then recorded what we saw. After selecting what we believed to be an E. coli coliform colony, we inoculated a TSA slant, in addition to another lactose broth, and incubated these for another 24 hours at 37°C. After incubation, we checked the broth for the production gas and a color change from red to yellow which would indicate the presence of an acid. In order to perform a gram stain, we obtained a colony that we had grown on the TSA slant. Then we gathered one test tube containing tryptone broth, one containing citrate slant, and the last two containing MVRP broths. For the MVRP broths, one test tube should be labeled with MR and the next tube should be labeled VP. Next, we inoculated each test tube with the coliforms that we had confirmed as containing negative

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