Serratia marcescens

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Serratia marcescens
Serratia marcescens colonies on the surface of an agar gel in a petri dish

Serratia marcescens colonies on the surface of an agar gel in a petri dish

Systematics
Department : Proteobacteria
Class : Gammaproteobacteria
Order : Enterobacterales
Family : Enterobacteriaceae
Genre : Serratia
Type : Serratia marcescens
Scientific name
Serratia marcescens
Bizio 1823
Colonies of Serratia marcescens on an agar plate

Serratia marcescens is a bacterium belonging to the genus Serratia in the Enterobacteriaceae ( Enterobacteria ) family.

features

The species Serratia marcescens includes gram-negative , facultative anaerobic , rod-shaped bacteria that actively move with peritrichally arranged flagella . Until a subspecies was discovered in 2003, it was assumed that Serratia marcescens - like all gram-negative bacteria - does not form endospores . This was confirmed by Serratia marcescens subsp. sakuensis refuted, the endospores could be seen under the electron microscope , they survive a common heat treatment, and the dipicolinic acid typical of the spore coat is detectable. However, the International Committee on Systematics of Prokaryotes has not yet been able to detect any spores in the isolate, and so has not confirmed the thesis that gene transfer with Bacillus spp. could have taken place in the wastewater.

Serratia marcescens produces the hydrolytic enzymes DNase , chitinase and lipase and can hydrolyze gelatin . It forms the restriction endonuclease Sma I, which is used in molecular biology.

They occur ubiquitously in the soil, water , on animals and plants and are usually harmless saprobionts ( destructors of organic substances). The bacteria can be cultivated on common nutrient media without any problems . Partially to form a red pyrrole - Pigment ( prodigiosin from latin prodigium  = sign which see Historical), whereby the colonies are stained red (see figure). This occurs more frequently with strains isolated from the environment than with clinical isolates from patients.

The genome of Serratia marcescens was the Sanger Institute ( Cambridge , United Kingdom complete) sequenced . It consists of a single, self-contained strand of DNA ( bacterial chromosome ) and is 5.1 MBp in size  .

Systematics

Serratia marcescens is the type species of the genus Serratia . This is the family of the Enterobacteriaceae , a large group of gram-negative bacteria. The species was first described in 1823 by Bartolomeo Bizio as Bacillus marcescens . The full name of the synonym is Bacillus marcescens (Bizio 1823) Trevisan in de Toni and Trevisan 1889. Other synonyms are not mentioned in the relevant lists. The previously taxonomically not well defined isolates "Enterobacteriaceae bacterium KO4" and "Pantoea sp. NAB7 “have been assigned to the species S. marcescens .

In 2003 the species was divided into two subspecies :

  • Serratia marcescens subsp. marcescens ( Bizio 1823) Ajithkumar et al. 2003
  • Serratia marcescens subsp. sakuensis Ajithkumar et al. 2003

This subspecies was found in the activated sludge of a wastewater treatment plant.

Human medical importance

With Serratia marcescens is an optional pathogens (so-called opportunistic pathogen ). It can cause the following diseases in people with a correspondingly immune deficiency: urinary tract infections , sepsis , pneumonia , endocarditis , meningitis , osteomyelitis .

The two subspecies of Serratia marcescens are  assigned to risk group 2 by the Biological Agents Ordinance in conjunction with the TRBA ( Technical Rules for Biological Agents) 466 . They are therefore considered to be bacteria that “can cause disease in humans and pose a risk to workers; it is unlikely to spread to the population; an effective prevention or treatment is normally possible ”. ( § 3 Biostoffverordnung). Furthermore, for S. marcescens subsp. marcescens also stated that it is pathogenic for humans and vertebrates , but that there is normally no transmission between host groups , i.e. it is not a zoonotic agent .

In the past, the bacterium was viewed as completely non-pathogenic (not causing disease ), it was only in the last few decades that its increasing importance as a causative agent of nosocomial diseases was recognized. Numerous outbreaks within healthcare facilities have been described, both in adults and in neonatal and pediatric intensive care units.

Spread

The bacteria are found everywhere in the soil, water, on animals and plants. The infection can therefore come from the environment, but also from person to person through direct contact, droplet infection or medical personnel. In healthy, immunocompetent people, contact with the pathogen does not usually lead to the development of a disease.

Frequency of diseases

Serratia marcescens is a rare pathogen. Urinary tract infections are caused by this bacterium about 2% of the time. In pneumonia and sepsis, the proportion is around 1%. These figures apply to community-acquired infections; the rate tends to be somewhat higher for nosocomial infections.

Diagnosis

The diagnosis is made by culturing the pathogen from blood and urine cultures, bronchial secretions or bronchoalveolar lavage . A well-suited nutrient medium is e.g. B. MacConkey agar . After creating a pure culture, the species can most easily be determined using biochemical methods ( “Bunte series” ).

therapy

Treatment of a disease caused by Serratia marcescens should, whenever possible, be carried out after a resistance test ( antibiogram ). The "calculated" therapy can e.g. B. be started with a fluoroquinolone or a carbapenem , possibly in combination with an aminoglycoside , e.g. B. Gentamicin . Due to the chromosomally encoded β-lactamase of the AmpC type, bacteria of the Serratia marcencens species have a natural resistance to a number of β-lactam antibiotics ( amoxicillin ± clavulanic acid , ampicillin ± sulbactam , first and second generation cephalosporins ). In addition, an aminoglycoside-cleaving enzyme of the AAC (6 ') - Ic type is encoded on the chromosome of S. marcescens and can impair the effectiveness of all aminoglycosides except gentamicin, streptomycin and arbekacin. There are also natural resistances to colistin and nitrofurantoin .

Another problem for therapy is the ability of S. marcescens to produce extended-spectrum-β-lactamases ( ESBL ) after purchasing the appropriate plasmids . This enables the bacteria to render antibiotics of the β-lactam type (e.g. all penicillins and cephalosporins) ineffective.

Veterinary importance

Scientists have now proven that Serratia marcescens causes the so-called white pox disease in hard corals of the species Acropora palmata . Genetic tests and laboratory tests have shown that this bacterium, which is deadly for corals, does not come from other animals, but from sewage from humans.

Of S. marcescens and other species of the genus is assumed since the 1960s that they for different insects are pathogenic, but with only moderate virulence . So were u. a. certain bacterial strains , designated as S. marcescens biotype A4b, have been found several times in diseased larvae of the Apis mellifera bee species ( Western honey bee ). Symptoms of the disease only appear when the bacteria get into the haemocoel (a secondary body cavity, compare also coelom ), which ultimately leads to fatal septicemia ("blood poisoning"). It is believed that the bacteria enter the digestive tract through ingestion of plant-based food and enter the haemocoel if the intestinal wall cracks spontaneously. In bees, infection may occur through the trachea , and because the disease often occurs in colonies infested by mites , the parasites could act as a vector. The insect hemolymph is usually bactericidal for non-pathogens but can not prevent Serratia and some other pathogens from multiplying . Bacterial enzymes (lecithinase, proteinase and chitinase ) are seen as virulence factors . For some insect taxa (including grasshoppers and cotton boll beetles ), LD 50 values have even been determined experimentally in relation to the number of cells which must be introduced into the hemocoel. However, if the bacteria are ingested with the food, the LD 50 value is higher.

In 1928, Carlton Earl Burnside , a research fellow at the US Department of Agriculture, isolated a bacterium from bees with septicemia that he first described as " Bacillus apisepticus " . 1959, this bacterium was by Canadians Landerkin and Katznelson in the genus Pseudomonas asked, and to this day it is the beekeeper -Fachliteratur mostly as " Pseudomonas apisepticus listed (Burnside, 1928)". The Czech Oleg Lysenko , however, found in 1963 that " P. apisepticus " is identical to S. marcescens . In 1979 a strain of " P. apisepticus " from the Microbial Research Institute in Ottawa was identified as S. marcescens biotype A4a. As early as the late 1950s, Lysenko and the Englishman JP Stevenson identified bacteria that cause septicemia in silkworms and desert locusts as a non-pigmented form of S. marcescens . However, the initial description of the various unpigmented insect pathogenic bacterial forms, with the exception of S. marcescens itself, does not meet the current requirements of the International Code of Bacteria Nomenclature . Among other things, there is no longer any original material that could be used to determine whether the strains identified as S. marcescens in the 1950s and 60s and originally assigned to other species were actually the same forms that were once named those other species had been described. Therefore, today neither “ Bacillus apisepticus ” or “ Pseudomonas apisepticus ” nor the names “ Bacillus noctuarum ” or “ Pseudomonas noctuarum ” and “ Aeromonas margarita ” associated with the work of Lysenkos and Stevensons are officially listed as synonyms for Serratia marcescens (see section Systematics ).

application

The enzyme Sma 1 is used in biochemistry and molecular biology to cut double-stranded DNA at a specific sequence.

Historical

Serratia marcescens was discovered on spoiled polenta in 1819 by the pharmacist Bartolomeo Bizio from Padua . He thought the colonies of the bacterium on the polenta were a fungus and named it Serratia after his physics teacher, the physicist and steamship designer Serafino Serrati from Florence, and because of its soft consistency marcescens ( Latin marcescere = slack). Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg named the bacterium Monas prodigiosa in 1848 without knowledge of Bizio's discovery .

The “ Miracle of Bolsena ” (1263) and other blood miracles are attributed to Serratia marcescens, which were very popular from the 13th century until the Reformation. Serratia marcescens can thrive on the unleavened hosts , which have been used for the celebration of the Latin Mass since the 12th century , and cause red discoloration, which gives the false impression of a miracle of the host . The alternative name Bacterium prodigiosum and the name of the dye prodigiosin it produces go back to the connection with these apparent miracles: Latin prodigium , "miracle sign".

In September 1950, two U.S. submarines sprayed Serratia marcescens off the coast of San Francisco to find out how many residents would become infected and how it spread. The bacterium is harmless to healthy people, but attacks immunocompromised people. There were deaths in hospitals that could be attributed to infection with the sprayed pathogens. Such field tests were carried out during the Cold War as part of the development of biological weapons .

In 2007, scientists used bacteria of this type to move small loads through a liquid. The aim of this research is to develop transport mechanisms for micromachines.

See also

swell

literature

  • Francine Grimont, Patrick AD Grimont: The Genus Serratia (Chapter 3.3.11) . In: Martin Dworkin, Stanley Falkow, Eugene Rosenberg, Karl-Heinz Schleifer, Erko Stackebrandt (eds.): The Prokaryotes. A Handbook on the Biology of Bacteria, Volume 6: Proteobacteria: Gamma Subclass . 3. Edition. Springer-Verlag, New York 2006, ISBN 0-387-25496-X , p. 219-244 , doi : 10.1007 / 0-387-30746-x_11 .
  • Stefan Winkle : The blood miracle as a microbiological and mass psychological phenomenon. Contribution to the history of the Bacterium prodigiosum (Serratia marcescens) and the phenomenology of intolerance. In: Laboratoriumsmedizin 7 (1983), Heft 9, pp 143-149.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b B. Ajithkumar, VP Ajithkumar u. a .: Spore-forming Serratia marcescens subsp. sakuensis subsp. nov., isolated from a domestic wastewater treatment tank. In: International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology. Volume 53, No. 1, January 2003, pp. 253-258, ISSN  1466-5026 . doi: 10.1099 / ijs.0.02158-0 . PMID 12656181 .
  2. ↑ a b c Steven D. Mahlen: Serratia infections: from military experiments to current practice . In: Clinical Microbiology Reviews . tape 24 , no. 4 . American Society for Microbiology, 2011, ISSN  0893-8512 , pp. 755-791 , PMID 21976608 ( asm.org [accessed February 17, 2013]).
  3. ↑ HM Aucken, TL Pitt: Antibiotic resistance and putative virulence factors of Serratia marcescens with respect to O and K serotypes. In: Journal of Medical Microbiology . tape 47 , no. 12 . Society for General Microbiology, 1998, ISSN  0022-2615 , pp. 1105–1113 , doi : 10.1099 / 00222615-47-12-1105 , PMID 9856647 (English, sgmjournals.org [PDF; accessed on February 17, 2013]).
  4. ^ A b c Jean Euzéby, Aidan C. Parte: Genus Serratia. In: List of Prokaryotic names with Standing in Nomenclature ( LPSN ). Retrieved August 6, 2014 .
  5. ↑ a b Serratia marcescens. In: Taxonomy Browser on the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) website . Retrieved August 6, 2014 .
  6. ↑ a b TRBA (Technical Rules for Biological Agents) 466: Classification of prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea) into risk groups. In: Website of the Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (BAuA). April 25, 2012, p. 200 , accessed April 30, 2014 .
  7. ^ R. Leclercq et al .: EUCAST expert rules in antimicrobial susceptibility testing . In: Clinical Microbiology and Infection . tape 19 , no. 2 . Wiley-Blackwell, 2013, ISSN  1469-0691 , pp. 141-160 , doi : 10.1111 / j.1469-0691.2011.03703.x , PMID 22117544 ( wiley.com [accessed February 17, 2013]).
  8. ↑ Kathryn L. Patterson et al .: The etiology of white pox, a lethal disease of the Caribbean elkhorn coral, Acropora palmata. In: Proc Natl Acad Sci USA , Vol. 99, No. 13, June 25, 2002, pp. 8725-30, PMID 12077296
  9. ↑ Kathryn Patterson Sutherland et al .: Human Pathogen Shown to Cause Disease in the Threatened Eklhorn Coral Acropora palmata. In: PLoS ONE , Vol. 6, No. 8, e23468, doi: 10.1371 / journal.pone.0023468
  10. ^ A b Francine Grimont, Patrick AD Grimont: The Genus Serratia. In: The Prokaryotes. A Handbook on the Biology of Bacteria, Volume 6. 2006, pp. 222-223.
  11. ^ A b c Aloysius Krieg: Diseases caused by bacteria and other prokaryotes. In: James R. Fuxa, Yoshinori Tanada (Eds.): Epizootiology of Insect Diseases. Wiley-Interscience, New York 1987, pp. 323-355 (pp. 328 f.), ISBN 0-471-87812-X .
  12. ↑ Patrick AD Grimont, Francine Grimont, Oleg Lysenko: Species and Biotype Identification of Serratia Strains Associated with Insects . In: Current Microbiology . tape 2 , no. 3 . Springer-Verlag, New York 1979, p. 139-142 , doi : 10.1007 / BF02605870 (English).
  13. ↑ GE Bucher: Nonsporulating Bacterial Pathogens. In: Edward Steinhaus (Ed.): Insect Pathology - An Advanced Treatise. Volume 2. Academic Press, New York / London 1963, pp. 117-147 (p. 127), doi: 10.1016 / B978-0-12-395603-3.50008-2 , ISBN 978-0-12-395603-3 .
  14. ↑ Stefan Winkle: The blood miracle as a microbiological and mass psychological phenomenon. In: Laboratoriumsmedizin 7 (1983), p. 147f.
  15. ↑ Stefan Winkle: The blood miracle as a microbiological and mass psychological phenomenon. In: Laboratoriumsmedizin 7 (1983), p. 143f.
  16. ^ Bacterial war before a federal court , HAZ (Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung), January 31, 1981, quoted in Jakob Segal, Lilli Segal: Aids - the trail leads to the Pentagon. In: Jakob Segal, Lilli Segal, Manuel Kiper (eds.): Biokrieg. Verlag Neuer Weg, 2nd supplemented edition, October 1990, ISBN 3-88021-199-X , p. 140
  17. ↑ Edward Steager, Chang-Beom Kim, Jigarkumar Patel, Socheth Bith, Chandan Naik: Control of microfabricated structures powered by flagellated bacteria using phototaxis . In: Applied Physics Letters . tape 90 , no. 26 , June 25, 2007, pp. 263901 , doi : 10.1063 / 1.2752721 .

Web links

Commons : Serratia marcescens  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Pigment rot and bleeding hosts  - sources and full texts