Oscillatory luminescence from lux-gene engineered bacteria

The experimental conditions for oscillatoryluminescence from Alcaligenes eutrophus harbouring luxCDABE genes inducible by copper were developed. The incubation of optimised bacterial suspensions (concentration of copper sulphate - 2 mM, concentration of biomass - 0.15-0.20 mg ml super(-1)) for 4-6 h under weak visible light followed by sudden transition of the cells to the dark resulted in pronounced oscillations with an average period of similar to 10 min.