Thermo Fisher Microbiological Media & Media Additives

Thermo Fisher offers a comprehensive range of microbiological culture media and media additives spanning routine bacteriology, food and water testing, environmental monitoring, and pharmaceutical quality control.

In this Collection, you can navigate by application stage and format—dehydrated powders for in-house preparation, ready-to-use plates and broths for speed, and targeted selective supplements for specificity. As a distributor, Iright can match exact Oxoid™ and Remel™ catalog numbers, documentation (SDS/CoA), and pack sizes to your method or pharmacopoeia needs, helping you standardize lots and keep workflows consistent across labs and sites.

Microbiological Culture Media & Additives: Overview

These products are designed to cultivate, isolate, enumerate, and identify bacteria, yeasts, and molds while maintaining traceable quality. Media provide the nutritional base and performance characteristics—general, selective, differential, or chromogenic—while additives fine-tune selectivity or recovery. Together, they let you move confidently from pre-enrichment to confirmation and antimicrobial susceptibility testing within a consistent brand system.

Culture media typically fall into general-purpose (e.g., TSA/TSB), selective/differential agars (e.g., MacConkey, XLD), and specialized formulations for AST (e.g., Mueller–Hinton). Media additives include antibiotic supplements, indicator substrates, growth factors, and targeted mixes for organisms like Listeria, Legionella, or Pseudomonas.

What Are Microbiological Media and Media Additives?

This section clarifies definitions so you can map products to your workflow. Media are the base matrices—agar, broth, or semi-solid—that support growth and deliver diagnostic signals; additives are concentrated supplements that impart selectivity, enhance visibility, or restore stressed cells without reformulating your base media.

General media (Tryptone Soya Agar/Broth) support broad recovery and validation work; selective agars such as MacConkey differentiate lactose-fermenters; XLD targets enteric pathogens; Mueller–Hinton standardizes AST; and pre-enrichment broths like Buffered Peptone Water resuscitate injured cells before selective steps. These roles are defined in Thermo Fisher’s Oxoid portfolio and its product specifications.

Formats & Product Families: Agar Plates, Broths, DCM Powders, Supplements

Different formats suit different throughput, compliance, and cost positions. The table below provides a quick orientation; choose by whether you need fast deployment (prepared media), maximum flexibility and economy (DCM powder), or targeted specificity (supplements).

Application Pathways: From Enrichment to Isolation and AST

Use this section to connect product choices to each procedural step. It helps standardize across labs and reduces re-validation when supply or pack sizes change.

Pre-enrichment/Resuscitation — For food and environmental samples, Buffered Peptone Water (BPW, CM0509) is used to resuscitate sub-lethally injured cells before selective enrichment or molecular assays.

Selective enrichment — To enrich Salmonella, Rappaport-Vassiliadis Soya Peptone (RVS) Broth, CM0866 applies low pH, magnesium chloride, and malachite green to suppress competitors while favoring salmonellae.

Isolation/Differentiation — Plate onto selective/differential agars such as MacConkey Agar (CM0007) for enterics and XLD Agar (CM0469) for Salmonella/Shigella screening in mixed flora.

Confirmation/General growth — Tryptone Soya Agar (CM0131) or Tryptone Soy Broth (CM0129) provides broad recovery and is referenced across pharmacopeias and methods.

Antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) — Mueller–Hinton Agar (CM0337) is the standardized medium aligned to EUCAST/CLSI guidance, supporting comparable zone diameters between sites.

How to Choose the Right Culture Media & Additives

Before ordering, define your target organisms (e.g., coliforms vs. Salmonella vs. Candida), workflow stage (pre-enrichment → selective enrichment → isolation → confirmation/AST), and regulatory context (ISO 11133, pharmacopoeial chapters, internal validation). From there, decide format (DCM vs. prepared) and selectivity (base medium alone vs. medium + supplement). This logic ensures the same outcome even if you need to switch pack sizes or vial yields later.

As a practical pattern: BPW for resuscitation → RVS for Salmonella enrichment → XLD for isolation → TSA/TSB for confirmation or handling isolates → Mueller–Hinton for AST. Supplements then tailor for specific organisms (e.g., chloramphenicol for yeasts/molds plating, Listeria or Legionella supplement systems).

Standards & Quality: ISO 11133 and USP <61>/<62> Compliance

Quality systems often require evidence that culture media meet performance criteria with reference strains and that lots are traceable. Oxoid specifications and IFUs describe performance testing, control strains, and—in many cases—alignment with ISO 11133 for food/water microbiology or pharmacopoeial media for pharmaceutical QC.

For example, RVS (CM0866) documents include ISO/CEN 11133 control strains in the test panel; Tryptone Soya Agar (CM0131) and TSB (CM0129) are cited for broad recovery and pharmacopoeial use; and Mueller–Hinton (CM0337) explicitly references EUCAST/CLSI use for AST. Keep CoAs on file per lot and ensure method suitability where required.

Storage & Handling for Culture Media and Supplements

Correct storage protects performance. Dehydrated powders should be kept closed, dry, and away from light; Thermo Fisher Dry-Bags for BPW specify 10–30 °C storage and light protection as a reference for similar dry formats. Always follow each product’s IFU for reconstitution, sterilization, and hold times.

Pay attention to special cases: XLD Agar (CM0469) is prepared by boiling to dissolve and must not be autoclaved; overheating degrades selectivity. Supplements are typically freeze-dried vials added aseptically to 500 mL–2.5 L of base medium at ~50 °C, per each SR product IFU.

Featured Thermo Scientific Oxoid & Remel Media

Below are representative, verified examples to anchor your SKU mapping. Use them as templates when expanding the catalog; Iright can add pack sizes and documentation links per item during build-out.

Core Media (Examples): The following entries cover general growth, selective/differential isolation, fungal work, pre-enrichment, and AST. Each row lists at least one official Thermo Fisher catalog number to ensure exact matching against procurement systems.

Selective Supplements (Examples): Use these SR-coded vials to add selectivity or antimicrobials to specified base media without changing your validated formulation; each vial treats a defined volume per IFU.

FAQs: Culture Media, Chromogenic Plates, and Supplements

This section gives crisp answers to recurring questions so teams can reuse them in method notes. Keep in mind that final acceptance criteria should follow your SOPs and any governing standards.

1. Do I need to autoclave every agar?

No. Follow each IFU precisely. For instance, XLD Agar is boiled to dissolve and specifically not autoclaved to preserve selectivity. Other media (e.g., TSA) are reconstituted and autoclaved per instructions.

2. Which medium is standard for disk diffusion AST?

Mueller–Hinton Agar is the standardized base for AST aligned to EUCAST/CLSI methodology, enabling comparable zone diameters between labs when prepared correctly.

3. When should I add a supplement instead of switching agar?

Use supplements when your base medium is already validated and you want to add or tighten selectivity—e.g., chloramphenicol for yeast/mold counts or Listeria/Legionella selective vials for targeted detection—without revising the underlying matrix.

4. How do I handle pre-enrichment for Salmonella testing from foods?

A typical flow is BPW (CM0509) for resuscitation followed by RVS broth (CM0866) for selective enrichment, then isolation on XLD or chromogenic Salmonella plates per your method.

Contact Iright for Thermo Fisher Media & Additives

If you already know your method and organism targets, send the required format (powder/plate/broth), lot documentation needs (SDS/CoA), and pack sizes. Iright will map your SOP to exact Thermo Scientific Oxoid/Remel SKUs and provide availability-based alternates (same formulation, different pack) while maintaining method integrity.