|
Human Milk Microbiome
The human milk microbiota, also known as human milk probiotics (HMP), encompasses the microbiota–the community of microorganisms–present within the human mammary glands and breast milk. Contrary to the traditional belief that human breast milk is sterile, advancements in both microbial culture and culture-independent methods have confirmed that human milk harbors diverse communities of bacteria. These communities are distinct in composition from other microbial populations found within the human body which constitute the human microbiome. The microbiota in human milk serves as a potential source of commensal, mutualistic, and potentially probiotic bacteria for the infant gut microbiota. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines probiotics as "living organisms which, when administered in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host." Occurrence Breast milk is a natural source of lactic acid bacteria for the newborn through breastfeeding, and may be considered a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Microscopy Image Of A Sample Of Human Breast Milk
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes''. It is similar in shape to the Ancient Greek letter alpha, from which it derives. The uppercase version consists of the two slanting sides of a triangle, crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The lowercase version can be written in two forms: the double-storey a and single-storey ɑ. The latter is commonly used in handwriting and fonts based on it, especially fonts intended to be read by children, and is also found in italic type. In English grammar, " a", and its variant " an", are indefinite articles. History The earliest certain ancestor of "A" is aleph (also written 'aleph), the first letter of the Phoenician alphabet, which consisted entirely of consonants (for that reason, it is also called an abjad to distinguish it fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Symbiosis
Symbiosis (from Greek , , "living together", from , , "together", and , bíōsis, "living") is any type of a close and long-term biological interaction between two different biological organisms, be it mutualistic, commensalistic, or parasitic. The organisms, each termed a symbiont, must be of different species. In 1879, Heinrich Anton de Bary defined it as "the living together of unlike organisms". The term was subject to a century-long debate about whether it should specifically denote mutualism, as in lichens. Biologists have now abandoned that restriction. Symbiosis can be obligatory, which means that one or more of the symbionts depend on each other for survival, or facultative (optional), when they can generally live independently. Symbiosis is also classified by physical attachment. When symbionts form a single body it is called conjunctive symbiosis, while all other arrangements are called disjunctive symbiosis."symbiosis." Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gram-positive Bacteria
In bacteriology, gram-positive bacteria are bacteria that give a positive result in the Gram stain test, which is traditionally used to quickly classify bacteria into two broad categories according to their type of cell wall. Gram-positive bacteria take up the crystal violet stain used in the test, and then appear to be purple-coloured when seen through an optical microscope. This is because the thick peptidoglycan layer in the bacterial cell wall retains the stain after it is washed away from the rest of the sample, in the decolorization stage of the test. Conversely, gram-negative bacteria cannot retain the violet stain after the decolorization step; alcohol used in this stage degrades the outer membrane of gram-negative cells, making the cell wall more porous and incapable of retaining the crystal violet stain. Their peptidoglycan layer is much thinner and sandwiched between an inner cell membrane and a bacterial outer membrane, causing them to take up the counterstain ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bifidobacterium
''Bifidobacterium'' is a genus of gram-positive, nonmotile, often branched anaerobic bacteria. They are ubiquitous inhabitants of the gastrointestinal tract though strains have been isolated from the vagina and mouth ('' B. dentium'') of mammals, including humans. Bifidobacteria are one of the major genera of bacteria that make up the gastrointestinal tract microbiota in mammals. Some bifidobacteria are used as probiotics. Before the 1960s, ''Bifidobacterium'' species were collectively referred to as ''Lactobacillus bifidus''. History In 1899, Henri Tissier, a French pediatrician at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, isolated a bacterium characterised by a Y-shaped morphology ("bifid") in the intestinal microbiota of breast-fed infants and named it "bifidus". In 1907, Élie Metchnikoff, deputy director at the Pasteur Institute, propounded the theory that lactic acid bacteria are beneficial to human health. Metchnikoff observed that the longevity of Bulgarians was the result of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nitrobacteraceae
The Nitrobacteraceae are a family of gram-negative, aerobic bacteria. They include plant-associated bacteria such as ''Bradyrhizobium'', a genus of rhizobia associated with some legumes. It also contains animal-associated bacteria such as '' Afipia felis'', formerly thought to cause cat-scratch disease. Others are free-living, such as '' Rhodopseudomonas'', a purple bacterium found in marine water and soils. The strain ''Rhodopseudomonas palustris'' DX-1 can generate an electric current with no hydrogen production, a trait being explored in the development of the microbial fuel cell. The genus ''Afipia'' has also been found in the atmosphere, where it uses methylsulfonylmethane as a carbon source.(page 3 and 5 of 6, quotes slightly edited). The bacteria of this family derive their energy from oxidizing ammonia to nitrite, or by oxidizing nitrite to nitrate. They are commonly found in freshwater and soil. Phylogeny The currently accepted taxonomy is based on the List of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sphingomonas
''Sphingomonas'' was defined in 1990 as a group of Gram-negative, rod-shaped, chemoheterotrophic, strictly aerobic bacteria. They possess ubiquinone 10 as their major respiratory quinone, contain glycosphingolipids (GSLs), specifically ceramide, instead of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) in their cell envelopes, and typically produce yellow-pigmented colonies. The GSL serves to protect the bacteria from antibacterial substances. Unlike most Gram-negative bacteria, ''Sphingomonas'' carries endotoxins and has a hydrophobic surface characterized by the short nature of the GSL's carbohydrate portion. By 2001, the genus included more than 20 species that were quite diverse in terms of their phylogenetic, ecological, and physiological properties. As a result, ''Sphingomonas'' was subdivided into different genera: ''Sphingomonas'', '' Sphingobium'', ''Novosphingobium'', '' Sphingosinicella'', and ''Sphingopyxis''. These genera are commonly referred to collectively as sphingomonads. Distinc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Propionibacterium
''Propionibacterium'' is a gram-positive, anaerobic, rod-shaped genus of bacteria named for their unique metabolism: They are able to synthesize propionic acid by using unusual transcarboxylase enzymes. Its members are primarily facultative parasites and commensals of humans and other animals, living in and around the sweat glands, sebaceous glands, and other areas of the skin. They are virtually ubiquitous and do not cause problems for most people, but propionibacteria have been implicated in acne and other skin conditions. One study found the ''Propionibacterium'' was the most prevalent human skin-associated genus of microorganisms. Members of the genus ''Propionibacterium'' are widely used in the production of vitamin B12, tetrapyrrole compounds, and propionic acid, as well as in the probiotics and cheese industries. The strain '' Propionibacterium freudenreichii'' subsp. ''shermanii'' is used in cheesemaking to create CO2 bubbles that become "eyes"—round holes in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ralstonia
''Ralstonia'' is a genus of bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were am ..., previously included in the genus '' Pseudomonas''. It is named after the American bacteriologist Ericka Ralston. Ericka Ralston was born Ericka Barrett in 1944 in Saratoga, California, and died in 2015 in Sebastopol, California. While in graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley, she identified 20 strains of ''Pseudomonas'' which formed a phenotypical homologous group, and named them ''Pseudomonas pickettii'', after M.J. Pickett in the Department of Bacteriology at the University of California at Los Angeles, from whom she had received the strains. Later, ''P. pickettii'' was transferred to the new genus ''Ralstonia'', along with several other species. She continued her resear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Corynebacterium
''Corynebacterium'' () is a genus of Gram-positive bacteria and most are aerobic. They are bacilli (rod-shaped), and in some phases of life they are, more specifically, club-shaped, which inspired the genus name ('' coryneform'' means "club-shaped"). They are widely distributed in nature in the microbiota of animals (including the human microbiota) and are mostly innocuous, most commonly existing in commensal relationships with their hosts. Some, such as '' C. glutamicum'', are commercially useful. Others can cause human disease, including, most notably, diphtheria, which is caused by ''C. diphtheriae''. As with various species of amicrobiota (including their relatives in the genera '' Arcanobacterium'' and ''Trueperella''), they usually are not pathogenic, but can occasionally opportunistically capitalize on atypical access to tissues (via wounds) or weakened host defenses. Taxonomy The genus ''Corynebacterium'' was created by Lehmann and Neumann in 1896 as a taxono ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pseudomonas
''Pseudomonas'' is a genus of Gram-negative, Gammaproteobacteria, belonging to the family Pseudomonadaceae and containing 191 described species. The members of the genus demonstrate a great deal of metabolic diversity and consequently are able to colonize a wide range of niches. Their ease of culture ''in vitro'' and availability of an increasing number of ''Pseudomonas'' strain genome sequences has made the genus an excellent focus for scientific research; the best studied species include '' P. aeruginosa'' in its role as an opportunistic human pathogen, the plant pathogen '' P. syringae'', the soil bacterium '' P. putida'', and the plant growth-promoting '' P. fluorescens, P. lini, P. migulae'', and ''P. graminis''. Because of their widespread occurrence in water and plant seeds such as dicots, the pseudomonads were observed early in the history of microbiology. The generic name ''Pseudomonas'' created for these organisms was defined in rather vague terms by Walter Migula ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Serratia
''Serratia'' is a genus of Gram-negative, facultatively anaerobic, rod-shaped bacteria of the family Yersiniaceae. According to the List of Prokaryotic names with Standing Nomenclature (LPSN), there are currently 19 species of ''Serratia'' that are credibly published with accurate names as of 2020: ''S. aquatilis, S. entomophila, S. ficaria, S. fonticola, S. grimesii, S. liquefaciens, S. marcescens, S. microhaemolytica, S. myotis, S. nematodiphila, S. odoriferae, S. oryzae, S. plymuthica, S. proteamaculans, S. quinivorans corrig, S. rubidaea, S. symbiotica, S. ureilytica, S. vespertilionis''. They are typically 1–5 μm in length, do not produce spores, and can be found in water, soil, plants, and animals. Some members of this genus produce a characteristic red pigment, prodigiosin, and can be distinguished from other members of the order Enterobacterales by their unique production of three enzymes: DNase ( nucA), lipase, and gelatinase ( serralysin). ''Serratia'' was thought t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Staphylococcus
''Staphylococcus'' is a genus of Gram-positive bacteria in the family Staphylococcaceae from the order Bacillales. Under the microscope, they appear spherical ( cocci), and form in grape-like clusters. ''Staphylococcus'' species are facultative anaerobic organisms (capable of growth both aerobically and anaerobically). The name was coined in 1880 by Scottish surgeon and bacteriologist Alexander Ogston (1844–1929), following the pattern established five years earlier with the naming of '' Streptococcus''. It combines the prefix "staphylo-" (from grc, σταφυλή, staphylē, bunch of grapes), and suffixed by the Modern (from ). Staphylococcus was one of the leading infections in hospitals and many strains of this bacterium have become antibiotic resistant. Despite strong attempts to get rid of them, staph bacteria stay present in hospitals, where they can infect people who are most at risk of infection. Staphylococcus includes at least 43 species. Of these, nine have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
