Bacillus anthracis

(noun)

Bacillus anthracis is the etiologic agent of anthrax and the only obligate pathogen within the genus Bacillus. B. anthrais a Gram-positive, endospore-forming, rod-shaped bacterium, with a width of 1-1.2µm and a length of 3-5µm.It can be grown in an ordinary nutrient medium under aerobic or anaerobic conditions.

Related Terms

Examples of Bacillus anthracis in the following topics:

  • Anthrax

    • Anthrax is a rare, infectious disease caused by Bacillus anthracis that can spread from animals to humans.
    • Anthrax is an acute disease caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis.
    • Bacillus anthracis is a rod-shaped, Gram-positive, aerobic bacterium about 1 by 9 micrometers in length.
    • B.anthracis bacterial spores have been known to have reinfected animals over 70 years after burial sites of anthrax-infected animals were disturbed.

  • Antibiotic Discovery

    • Antibiosis was first described in 1877 in bacteria when Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch observed that an airborne bacillus could inhibit the growth of Bacillus anthracis.

  • Bacterial Pneumonias

    • Other important Gram-positive causes of pneumonia are Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus anthracis.

  • Endospores

    • Examples of bacteria that can form endospores include Bacillus and Clostridium.
    • Bacteria having a centrally placed endospore include Bacillus cereus, and those having a subterminal endospore include Bacillus subtilis.
    • As a simplified model for cellular differentiation, the molecular details of endospore formation have been extensively studied, specifically in the model organism Bacillus subtilis.
    • Endospores of the bacterium Bacillus anthracis were used in the 2001 anthrax attacks.
    • A stained preparation of Bacillus subtilis showing endospores as green and the vegetative cell as red.

  • History of Microbiology: Hooke, van Leeuwenhoek, and Cohn

    • Among other things Cohn is remembered for being the first to show that Bacillus can change from a vegetative state to an endospore state when subjected to an environment deleterious to the vegetative state.
    • He found that the blood of cattle who were infected with anthrax always had large numbers of Bacillus anthracis.

  • Siderophores

    • For example, the anthrax pathogen Bacillus anthracis releases two siderophores, bacillibactin and petrobactin, to scavenge ferric iron from iron proteins.

  • Sporulation in Bacillus

    • Bacillus subtilis is a rod-shaped, Gram-postive bacteria that is naturally found in soil and vegetation.

  • Glycocalyx

    • ., polypeptide in B. anthracis).

  • Koch and Pure Culture

    • After Casimir Davaine demonstrated the direct transmission of the anthrax bacillus between cows, Koch studied anthrax more closely.
    • He invented methods to purify the bacillus from blood samples and grow pure cultures.

  • Relative Resistance of Microbes

    • A stained preparation of Bacillus subtilis showing endospores as green and the vegetative cell as red.