Microbial genetics and molecular cloning now permit us to routinely isolate specific genes from a variety of microbial pathogens. Obviously not all genes from pathogenic microorganisms play a role in pathogenicity or virulence. Just as Koch's postulates were formulated to identify the causal relationship between an organism and a specific disease, the notion is presented here that a form of mol...

In recent years, there has been an increase in the rate and severity of diseases affecting habitat-forming marine organisms, such as corals, sponges, and macroalgae. Delisea pulchra is a temperate red macroalga that suffers from a bleaching disease that is more frequent during summer, when seawater temperatures are elevated and the alga's chemical defense is weakened. A bacterial cause for the ...

Recently, reports of coral disease have increased significantly across the world's tropical oceans. Despite increasing efforts to understand the changing incidence of coral disease, very few primary pathogens have been identified, and most studies remain dependent on the external appearance of corals for diagnosis. Given this situation, our current understanding of coral disease and the progres...

contact lens wearers are at great risk of developing microbial keratitis because of incorrect usages and unhygienic maintenance of contact lenses. therefore, the present study was planned to provide data that will be helpful in selecting the anti-microbial to cure microbial keratitis. one hundred bacterial isolates from conjunctiva of contact lenses wearer were isolated, identified and subjecte...

The complexity of the human microbiome makes it difficult to reveal organizational principles of the community and even more challenging to generate testable hypotheses. It has been suggested that in the gut microbiome species such as Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron are keystone in maintaining the stability and functional adaptability of the microbial community. In this study, we investigate the i...

The incidence of diabetes mellitus is rapidly increasing throughout the world. Although the exact cause of the disease is not fully clear, perhaps, genetics, ethnic origin, obesity, age, and lifestyle are considered as few of many contributory factors for the disease pathogenesis. In recent years, the disease progression is particularly linked with functional and taxonomic alterations in the ga...

The Human Pan-Microbe Communities (HPMC) database (http://www.hpmcd.org/) provides a manually curated, searchable, metagenomic resource to facilitate investigation of human gastrointestinal microbiota. Over the past decade, the application of metagenome sequencing to elucidate the microbial composition and functional capacity present in the human microbiome has revolutionized many concepts in o...

The canine intestinal tract harbors a highly complex microbial ecosystem. Various studies have reported changes in microbial communities in acute and chronic gastrointestinal diseases, especially in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and acute diarrhea. Most commonly observed are decreases in the bacterial phyla Firmicutes (i.e., Lachnospiraceae, Ruminococcaceae, Faecalibacterium) and Bacteroidet...

While preparing to teach the Microbial Pathogenesis graduate course at our institution, we found ourselves struggling to find basic definitions of virulence and pathogenicity that incorporated the contributions of both the host and the pathogen. The generally used definition of a pathogen as a microbe that causes disease in a host (Table 1) seemed inadequate, because some microbes do not cause ...

The resident microbial community, harboured by humans in sites such as the skin and gastrointestinal tract, is enormous, representing a candidate environmental factor affecting susceptibility to complex diseases, where both genetic and environmental risk factors are important. The potential of microorganisms to influence the human immune system is considerable, given their ubiquity. The impact ...