Division 9.5 Fatty acid profiling (FAP)F1

Grow the culture on trypticase soy agar (Oxoid) for 72 hours at 21 °C (+/– 1°).

Apply an appropriate FAP procedure (Janse, 1991; Stead, 1992).

A positive FAP test is achieved if the profile of the presumptive culture is identical to that of the positive control. The presence of characteristic fatty acids are 15:1 Anteiso A, 15:0 Iso, 15:0 Anteiso, 16:0 Iso, 16:0 and 17:0 Anteiso is highly indicative of C. m. sepedonicus . Other genera such as Curtobacterium, Arthrobacter and Micrococcus also have some of these acids but 15:1 Anteiso A is a rare acid in these bacteria but occurs in all Clavibacter spp. at between 1 to 5 %. In C. m. sepedonicus the value is usually around 5 %.