[Isolation and characterization of genetic recombinants in protoplast fusion in Saccharopolyspora erythraea].

Formation of genetic recombinants after conjugation and protoplast fusion in Saccharopolyspora erythraea, an organism producing erythromycin, was studied comparatively. After the protoplast fusion the frequency of all the classes of the haploid recombinants increased 10 to 460 times by comparison with the conjugation. The protoplast fusion was characterized by higher diversity of the recombinant classes, up to 45.5 per cent of the recombinants being formed at the account of multiple crossing overs. It was shown that unlike conjugation of the S. erythraea strains the protoplast fusion had no gradient of inheritance of the parent genetic markers by the recombinants. The results indicated that in S. erythraea protoplast fusion the recombination involved more genes of the parent strains. This makes promising the procedure for genetic analysis and design of erythromycin-producing strains.