Free-living amoebae are amphizoic organisms living in soil, air, fresh and sea water. Species belonging to the genera Acanthamoeba, Naegleria and Balamuthia are human parasites, which may invade the central nervous system, lungs, adrenal glands, skin, eyes and lower jaw. In this paper, we examine the occurrence of potentially virulent strains of amoebae in water bodies of the West Pomeranian an...

Testate amoebae (TA) are a group of free-living protozoa, important in ecology and paleoecology. Testate amoebae taxonomy is mainly based on the morphological features of the shell, as examined by means of light microscopy or (environmental) scanning electron microscopy (SEM/ESEM). We explored the potential applications of confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM), two photon excitation microsc...

background: members of the vannellidae family are free-living amoebae (fla) distributed mainly in water and soil sources. the present study reports the first isolation of this genus in the biofilm source from hospital environment in tehran, iran. methods: biofilm samples were collected from hospital environment. cultivation was performed in non-nutrient agar covered with a heat-killed escherich...

Tests for potentially pathogenic amoebae were carried out in order to determine the presence of free-living amoebae of genus Acanthamoeba in soil and beach sand sources related to human environments in Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain. Acanthamoeba identification was based on the morphology of cyst and trophozoite forms and PCR amplification with a genus specific primer pair. The pathogenical po...

The free-living amoebae Naegleria species (spp.) have been recognized as etiologic agents of amoebic encephalitis, keratitis, otitis, lung lesions and other skin infections mainly in immuno-compromised individuals. In this study, morphological and biochemical characterization of Naegleia strains isolated from the Egyptian aquatic environment were surveyed. Some Naegleria species were cultivated...

Overwhelming contamination of a continuous cell line with a free-living soil amoeba of the genus Hartmannella is reported. The significance of the finding is discussed because of recent interest shown in the role of this and related species of amoebae in disease of humans. The methods used to detect and identify the amoeba are described and some examples of the amoebae are shown by photomicrogr...

Free-living amoebae cause three well-defined disease entities: a rapidly fatal primary meningoencephalitis, a chronic granulomatous amoebic encephalitis (GAE), and a chronic amoebic keratitis. GAE occurs in immunocompromised persons. Recently, another type of free-living amoeba, Balamuthia mandrillaris, has been shown to cause GAE. The finding that this amoeba has caused infection in some healt...