Trypticase soy agar

Trypticase soy agar is a bacterial growth medium.

TSA is a general purpose medium, providing enough nutrients to allow for a wide variety of microorganisms to grow. It is used for a wide range of applications including; culture storage, enumeration (counting), isolation of pure cultures or simply general culture. e.g. Tryptocase Soy Agar (TSA) Tryptocase Soy Broth (TSB) Nutrient Agar

The medium contains enzymatic digests of casein and soybean meal which provides amino acids and other nitrogenous substances making it a nutritious medium for a variety of organisms. Glucose is the energy source. Sodium chloride maintains the osmotic equilibrium, while dipotassium phosphate acts as buffer to maintain pH. Agar extracted from any number of organisms is used as a gelling agent.

The medium may be supplemented with blood to facilitate the growth of more fastidious bacteria or antimicrobial agents to permit the selection of various microbial groups from pure microbiota. As with any media, minor changes may be made to suit specific circumstances. TSA is frequently the base media of other agar plate type, i.e. blood agar plates (BAP) are made by enriching TSA plates with blood

One liter of the agar contains:^[1]

• 15 g Tryptone
• 5 g Soytone - enzymatic digest of soybean meal
• 5 g Sodium Chloride
• 15 g Agar

Notes

References

• http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2000-02/951527342.Mi.r.html