Identification of Lactic Acid Bacteria from Luwak (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus) Gastrointestinal Tract

Luwak is a mammal that is widely cultivated to produce luwak coffee. Luwak coffee is a rare and one of the world's most expensive coffees from Indonesia. Numerous enzymes and microorganisms, many of which are lactic acid bacteria, contribute to the production of the coffee aroma. This research aims to identify lactic acid bacteria from luwak digestion accurately down to the species level. The parameters tested in this study were Gram staining, bacterial resistance to acid, bacterial resistance to bile salts, and genotypic identification of isolates using the 16S rRNA gene sequencing method. The results found that US1, FS3, FS4 and FS6 were identified as Leuconostoc pseudomesenteroides, US2 and US3 were identified as Lactobacillus plantarum, FS2 was identified as Weissella cibaria and FS5 was identified as Staphylococcus haemolyticus. All of these isolates were included in Gram-positive based on the results of Gram staining. However, among the 8 isolates obtained, one isolate, namely FS5 (S. haemolyticus), was not a lactic acid bacterium, but a pathogenic bacterium. This information can be used for the development of luwak origin bacteria for in vitro coffee fermentation purposes. © 2021 Friends Science Publishers