Pathogen Research Paper

Clostridium botulinum is an, anaerobic, gram-positive, spore-forming bacteria that causes the disease known as botulism (Smith and Sugiyama, 1988). It produces a potent neurotoxin called botulinum toxin which causes botulism or more specifically foodborne botulism. The spores of the bacteria can survive high temperatures and can live in foods that are incorrectly or poorly processed (FDA). There are seven types of botulism recognized, (A-G), but only A, B, E, and F cause human botulism (FDA).

There are many reasons for knowing the identity of microorganisms. The reasons range from knowing the causative agent of a disease in a patient, so as to know how it can be treated, to knowing the correct microorganism to be used for making certain foods or antibiotics. This study was done by applying all of the methods that I have been learned so far in the microbiology laboratory class for the identification of an unknown bacterium.

Abbreviated to BoNT, there are seven serotypes of botulinum neurotoxin, denoted BoNT-A through to BoNT-G, all of which are released by strains of the Clostridium botulinum; an anaerobic, rod shaped, gram-positive bacterium which is usually prevalent in soils and is capable of forming endospores, (Samul et al., 2013). These endospores can survive high temperatures, (Sobel, 2005), explaining how the major route of infection occurs. The endospores can contaminate food production, surviving the high cooking temperatures, and end up in jarred and tinned food. After germination, the endospore releases its neurotoxins which are consumed and lead to a potentially fatal disease known as botulism. Thanks to food production regulations, these cases are rare in the UK, however there was a case in Scotland in 2011, where three children acquired botulism after eating a jarred sauce, (Browning et al., 2011). Most cases of food-borne botulism are from home made food, where industrial regulations aren’t followed during “canning” or “jarring”, (McLauchlin et al., 2006).

Clostridium botulinum is a kind of bacterium that is responsible for botulism. This is a Gram-positive, rod-shaped bacterium. There are 7 types of toxins caused by C.botulinum, A-G, but only 4 of these toxin are known to cause a disease in humans they are A, B,E, and F. Only type A is universal throughout the world. Toxin G is encoded in the plasmid unlike the rest are encoded in the bacterial chromosome. What is special about type C. Botulinum is that it can only produce its toxin during sporulation. Clostridium botulinum will only become active when the environmental conditions are appropriate but other than that the endospores of Clostridium botulinum will stay “asleep” in contaminated foods. This type

Clostridium botulinum produces botulinum toxin which is the strongest human known toxin. This makes it have great potential for use as a bioweapon. The concern for this has risen due to Iraq’s production, under Saddam Hussein’s rule, of 19,000 liters of botulinum toxin in 1995. This amount is enough to kill the entire population of humans on earth, three times over. The use of this neurotoxin could be in the form of aerosol or food contamination. For this reason, it is highly studied. It is also the reason I picked Clostridium botulinum as the bacterium to do my research paper on.

Clostridium botulinum has a rich history dating back to 19th century Europe where it first contaminated sausages, causing outbreaks of foodborne botulism. (1-3) In fact, the term botulism is derived from the Latin term botulus, meaning sausage. (1,3) Microbiologist Emile Pierre Marie van Ermengem first described the etiologic agent in 1897, (1-3) following isolation of the anaerobic bacillus from ham and splenic tissue obtained upon autopsy. (2,3) Although first referred to as Bacillus botulinus, it was eventually renamed Clostridium botulinum to distinguish it from the aerobic spore-forming genus Bacillus. (2) Importantly, the presence of a toxin was noted at this time, as cell-free extracts were capable of causing disease. (1,2)

Step 1: Written observation of the symptoms of the fruit and signs of the pathogen.

Many countries use the fermentation method in order to preserve or enhance the flavors of foods. However, the result of fermentation can also lead to drastic symptoms. For instance, the article “Food-Borne Paralysis from Eating Home-Pickled Eggs” from an Outbreak 37 article is about a 68-year-old man having symptoms involving paralysis and muscle weakness after eating the home-pickled eggs that he had made. This is one example of what we call Clostridium Botulinum. Clostridium Botulinum is a rod-shaped bacterium with a terminal endospore. This pathogen grows best around room temperature to warm areas and loves the environment that has soil. They are also gram-positive bacteria. There are three types of Clostridium Botulism: foodborne, infant botulism, and wound. These different types of botulism have different symptoms, causes, preventions, and treatments. C. Botulinum has spores that releases toxins and can germinate and affect other organisms. This neurotoxin is highly toxic which can make a person have paralysis. Originally, there are more than four different types of botulism, but those other types of botulism do not affect human’s health.

In this paper we will be discussing Botulism. Botulism is a type of food poisoning that is both rare and serious. Botulism can be caused by different strains of the bacterium Clostridium, however, it is usually is caused by Clostridium botulinum. Botulism can cause severe symptoms, including paralytic symptoms that can eventually lead to death. There are different types of botulism including foodborne botulism, wound botulism, and infant botulism. All types of botulism may be lethal and should always be considered a medical emergency. If illness is left untreated the possibility is greatly increased. We will also discuss a rare case of

My future career is becoming an Infectious Disease Specialist. This is a career in the medical field where a patient might have a disease that is contagious and their blood, urine etc. samples come to the specialists. The specialists see what kind of disease the patient has based off of this. They can determined if it can be treated and how to plan to contain the disease so no one else gets it. An example of using the Respiratory anatomy knowledge in my career field might be seen on the patient. A patient might have an infectious Respiratory disease that comes into the hospital. The nurses or regular onsite doctors might do a series of tests on the respiratory part of the body. A test might be a Pulmonary Function Test (PFT) which measures

However, to find better antitoxins or further research, animal testing is conduced, which could be an issue posing ethical concerns. The majority of food borne botulism cases are caused by improper canning methods. The disease would be significantly less prevalent if people were restricted from canning food; yet, this would not be ethical. Consequently, the effects of botulism are managed with proper treatments and increasing education about the disease. The CDC identifies the opportunities of this disease as increasing clinical and consumer education in combination with applying tools of molecular biology (CDC, 2016). The applications of this theory should lead to decreased incidence rates of

Have you ever wondered what Germs are and what they do? Well Germs are tiny organisms that can cause diseases. Once they get inside your body gems can devour your nutrients and energy. They can produce toxins that cause infections like fevers, rashes, sniffles, coughing, etc.Two major types of germs are viruses and bacteria.

Included is a list of tasks and procedures, or groups of closely related tasks and procedures, in which occupational exposure may occur to these individuals:

Enthusiasm for food safety has developed as food supply chains the world over have endured one type of food scare or the other (Kaferstein et al., 1997, Mørkbak et al. 2010). Despite the fact that, the Food Standard Agency (FSA) UK, reported a 19.2% decrease in food borne ailments somewhere around 2000 and 2006, there were still more than 53,000 research facility reported instances of food borne pathogens in the UK in 2005 (FSA, 2007). In 2006, the Agency directed 1,342 examinations of food related occurrences including prominent cases like the salmonella flare-up connected with chocolate, benzene in sodas and the unapproved genetically adjusted living being (GMO) contamination of U.S. rice (FSA, 2007).

Toxins are poisons produced by living organisms. Epidemics of staphylococcal food poisoning are very common across the world. But, there is hardly any report of SFP from the Indian subcontinent. An outbreak occurred in Indian country, the Madhya Pradesh’s state after the ingestion of a snack that made up with potato balls fried in vegetable oil, called “Bhalla”. More than 100 children and adults who ate the snack suffered from the normal side effects of SFP and required hospitalization. From the clinical sample of food, there were found a large number of enterotoxigenic Staphylococcus aureus that appeared (Vijay et al., 2007). Hence, one of the seven enterotoxins that produced by strains of Staphylococcus aureus was Staphylococcal enterotoxin B (SEB).