Klebsiella pneumoniae triggers a cytotoxic effect on airway epithelial cells.

Background: Klebsiella pneumoniae is a capsulated Gram negative bacterial pathogen and a frequent cause of nosocomial infections. Despite its clinical relevance, little is known about the features of the interaction between K. pneumoniae and lung epithelial cells on a cellular level, neither about the role of capsule polysaccharide, one of its best characterised virulence factors, in this interaction.

Alkaliflexus imshenetskii gen. nov. sp. nov., a new alkaliphilic gliding carbohydrate-fermenting bacterium with propionate formation from a soda lake.

Anaerobic saccharolytic bacteria thriving at high pH values were studied in a cellulose-degrading enrichment culture originating from the alkaline lake, Verkhneye Beloye (Central Asia). In situ hybridization of the enrichment culture with 16S rRNA-targeted probes revealed that abundant, long, thin, rod-shaped cells were related to Cytophaga. Bacteria of this type were isolated with cellobiose and five isolates were characterized.

Coexistence of two distinct copies of naphthalene degradation genes in Pseudomonas strains isolated from the western Mediterranean region.

We analyzed the occurrence of the naphthalene degradation upper-pathway (nah) genes in the western Mediterranean region. The amplification, restriction, and sequence analysis of internal fragments for several nah genes (nahAc, nahB, nahC, and nahE) from naphthalene-degrading strains isolated from this geographical area proved the coexistence of two distinct sets of nah genes.