[Clostridium thermocellum--a new object of genetic studies].

: A pronounced cellulolytic activity of the anaerobic thermophilic bacterium Clostridium thermocellum makes it a promising object for biotechnology, which requires elaboration of the methods for genetic analysis of this microorganism. At the first stage of the studies aimed at development of methods of the genetic material transfer to Clostridium thermocellum we elaborated a procedure for producing and regenerating protoplasts with the efficiency of up to 1%. The protoplast transformation was performed by the DNA of shuttle vectors pHV33 (KmRTcRApR) and pMK419 (CmRApR) constructed in this work. Modifications of the previously described methods of plasmid DNA isolation were developed. The cryptic 25 kb and 45-50 kb plasmids were detected in the strains F1 and F7 and isolated.