P. larvae germination in BAD medium assay

Checked blot plates stored non-inverted in the 37C static incubator from 7-10-14. The 10 uL drops had soaked into the MYPGP agar by now and look good, however, there was development of large slimly droplets on top of the agar and not always on top of where the 10 uL drops were placed. These mysterious blobs were seen on almost all of the plates (including both BAD and H2O treatment groups). Pictures of the blobs are shown below.

This was a new batch of MYPGP agar made two days before use. They were visibly darker than those previously made. It is possible that an ingredient was or wasn't added at the correct concentration. I will double check my notes to see what amounts of each ingredient was added for this batch.

Some of the plates showed signs of dehydration or cracking of the agar (right image). This is odd since they have only been incubating for 24 hours and they weren't thinner than a usual agar plate that can be incubated for weeks before they begin to dry out. I have no idea what those mysterious blobs are from. Could it be possible that they are some sort of component of the media that pooled during incubation? Or some sort of contaminant?

The blobs are creamy in color and have an almost sticky texture, similar to the BAD that was used. However, the blobs appeared on plates from the H2O treatment, the ones that didn't even have BAD!

I isolation streaked out the mysterious blob onto LB agar and an old plate of MYPGP agar from a previous batch and incubated them at 37C. I also pipetted up some of blob (about 50 uL) and froze it at -20C just in case.

The blot plates were all transferred to the 37C 5%CO2 incubator and carefully inverted.

//EWW