Alkaliphiles: Diversity, Adaptation and Applications

Alkaliphiles are some of the major extremophiles which occupy a certain niche of the globe where the pH values are usually two unit higher that the neutrality. Although abundantly found in rare geographical regions, these organisms are of immense importance in terms of their enzymatic activities which enable them to be functional under extreme alkaline conditions and therefore have numerous industrial and biotechnological applications. Their unique mode of adaptation and exclusive ability of resource utilisation make their existence interesting for biotechnological research. The study of alkaliphiles revealed the potential of these microorganisms in the bioremediation of the soda lake, their efficiency to degrade complex organic compounds and a certain class of antibiotics produced by them are of immense importance for the pharmaceutical industries. Recent advancements in genetic studies and recombinant DNA technology allowed the understanding of their genetic modifications which are unique to their taxa and helped researchers to utilise their coding sequence for isolation and purification of commercially important alkaline active enzymes. Despite all the beneficial effects, the isolation, culturing and study of alkaliphiles are among the most challenging tasks and matters of continuous research. This chapter will elaborate on the existence of some important alkaliphilic bacteria in the rare alkaline region of the globe, the diversities among them, their metabolic activities, unique adaptation and modifications in their structural and genomic profile and also summarises the commercially important product isolated from them.