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Microorganisms
Name
Institution
Introduction
This paper is concerned with the selection, description and documentation of some microorganisms. Their physical properties e.g., their structure, function, virulence, treatment and use will be discussed after deliberate painstaking analysis from the pre-existing relevant literature. Identity of selected microorganisms will be disclosed in the later sections.
Microorganisms
Microorganisms are referred as living beings that are hard to be seen with naked eye and are visible only through microscope. These organisms can exist in form of single cell and colonies. There are five primary categories of microorganisms:
Bacteria
Virus
Fungi
Protozoa
Algae
Microorganisms will be selected from above mentioned categories. Let’s discuss them one by one.
Organism I: Escherichia coli (Bacteria)
Table 1
Tabular description of selected bacteria; E. coli
Sr.
Properties
Description
1
Biological name
Escherichia coli
2
Type and structure
Gram negative, facultative anaerobic and rod shaped,
Image: Microscopic view of E. coli
3
Class, Family
Gammaproteobacteria, Enterobacteriaceae
4
Gram Reaction
It produces pink stains when subjected to gram solution e.g., Crystal violet, Iodine stain and Carbol Fuschin. Pink color is the indication of absence of thick peptidoglycan cell wall responsible for purple color (Kaper, Nataro & Mobley, 2004).
Image: Pink stains of E. coli after gram test indicating their gram negative nature
5
Habitat
They live in the skin of animals and intestines of healthy humans and animals. Besides this, air, water and soil also contain these bacteria (Qadri et. al., 2005).
6
Mode of transmission
Various modes of transmission include (Qadri et, al., 2005):
Untreated milk: From the milking equipment and cow’s udder; these bacteria can be transferred to humans in case they consume unpasteurized milk.
Meat: as it lives in animal’s intestines, uncooked or improperly cooked meat has the potential to transfer this into human’s body.
Water: drinking water enriched with E. coli can act as a strong mode of transmission.
Animals: Skin of pets and zoo animals contains these bacteria which can be transferred to humans through touching.
Humans: touching an infected person and forgetting washing hands before eating something or taking hands to mouth can cause their transmittal readily.
Vegetables and Fruits: manure from animals mixed with water which is being used in agriculture, it can be transmitted from such vegetables to humans during consumption.
7
Virulence
It is potent enough to spread following diseases: fever, abdominal cramps, blood vomiting, dehydration, fatigue, nausea and kidney failure (in severe instances) (Weintraub, 2007)
8
Treatment
Although its treatment is readily available yet symptoms can be eliminated by various evidence-based home remedies within few days. Treatment is typically concerned with the precautionary measurements encapsulating (Weintraub, 2007):
Avoid drinking contaminated water and edibles
Eat properly cooked meat
Boil milk before use
Wash hands after touching contaminated animal or individual
9
Benefit
Keep digestive track healthy and up-to-date (Kaper, Nataro & Mobley, 2004).
Organism II: Human Immunodeficiency Virus HIV (Virus)
Table 2
Tabular description of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)
Sr.
Properties
Description
1
Biological name
Human Immunodeficiency Virus-HIV
2
Physical structure
Round shaped having two single RNA strands used for carrying genetic information to affected person. They lack their own bio-machinery for metabolism and other significant cellular activities therefore they completely take hold over human’s biological mechanisms, leaving them with compromised immune system (Albert et. al, 2014).
Image: microscopic view of HIV
3
Family, Genus
Retroviridae, Lentivirus
4
Habitat
It is found within human beings. Common habitat includes blood, semen, feces, saliva, breast milk, vaginal and cervical secretions (Aral, 2007).
5
Mode of transmission
It has diverse modes of transmission including (Gazzard et. al., 2011):
Sexual intercourse between infected and healthy individuals
Sharing needles
Blood transfusion
Mother to child (prenatal transmission)
6
Virulence
It causes Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) which is a burning medical crisis in current era despite technological advancements. Its symptoms include (Aral, 2007).
Cough and shortened breathe
Night sweats
Recurrent fever
Sores, lesions and rashes around mouth or genitals
Diarrhea
Weight loss
Nausea
Sore throat
Headache
Muscle aches
Join pain
Neurological conditions e.g., memory and nervousness
7
Treatment
Widely-acknowledged treatments for AIDS include (Aral, 2007):
Protease inhibitors (PIs): These drugs include substances that inactivate protein necessary for virus to replicate its DNA.
Fusion inhibitors: These drugs inhibit the entrance of HIV into the most supreme immune system cell e.g., CD4 T cells.
Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NNRTIs): These drugs inhibit a protein required by HIV for the formation of new nucleosides.
Nucleoside or nucleotide reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs): These drugs inhibit a protein required by HIV for the formation of new nucleotides. As these are artificial and faulty versions of proteins required by HIV for its replication. Hence, faulty versions lead to faulty replication and ultimately their death.
Integrase inhibitors: Integrase is an enzyme that HIV uses to insert genetic material into human CD4 T cell. Integrate inhibitors suppress their formation.
Organism III: Yeast (Fungi)
Table 3
Tabular description of yeast
Sr.
Properties
Description
1
Biological name
Saccharomyces cerevisiae
2
Physical Structure
They are egg shaped structures which are visible only with microscope. It is also called sugar eating fungi because it uses different forms of carbohydrates for survival (Townsend et. al., 2006).
Image: microscopic view of yeast
3
Family, Genus
Saccharomycetaceae, Saccharomyces
5
Habitat
They are found in diverse environment including soil, fruit and vegetable leaves, fruits and flowers, skin surface of warm-blooded animals and their intestinal track as well (Cimolai, Gill & Church, 1987).
6
Mode of transmission
Consuming infected fruits and vegetables without washing appropriately. Eating improperly cooked meat (Townsend et. al., 2006).
7
Virulence
The most common virulence includes vaginitis. Symptoms are as follows (Wang et. al., 2012):
Vaginal irritation and itching
Pain after intercourse
Pain after urination
Light vaginal spotting
Change in color and amount of vaginal discharges
8
Treatment
Diflucan is an oral medication used for mitigating vaginitis. Furthermore, various preventive measures help reduce its onset instances including (Wang et. al., 2012):
Avoiding hot bathing
Avoiding Excessive vaginal bathing
Yeast grows rapidly in moist, avoiding areas from being moist for longer times is beneficial for it.
Image: Diflucan for vaginal yeast infection
9
Benefits
Its inactive form boosts immunity
lowers the cholesterol down
protects body against oxidative damage
Its active form is used in baking industries (Cimolai, Gill & Church, 1987).
Organism IV: Plasmodium falciparum (Protozoa)
Table 4
Tabular representation of Plasmodium falciparum
Sr.
Properties
Description
1
Biological name
Plasmodium falciparum
2
Physical Structure
It is unicellular parasite in humans exclusively responsible for malaria (Miller et. al., 2002).
Image: Plasmodium falciparum microscopic view
3
Family, Genus
Plasmodiidae, Malaria parasite
4
Habitat
It is present in contaminated water. It spends it lifetime within the body of anopheles mosquito where it remains inactive till its transference into the body of vertebrate host (Pain & Hertz, 2009).
6
Mode of transmission
Its mode of transmission is ‘anopheles mosquito biting.” When this mosquito bites humans, it is transferred to the human blood and pathogenic activity is initiated (Miller et. al., 2003).
7
Virulence
It is responsible for malaria which includes following symptoms (Miller et. al., 2002):
Nausea
Vomiting
Abdominal pain
Fever
Night sweats
Headache
Shaking chills ranging from light to severe
Anemia
Muscle pain
Bloody stools
Convulsions
8
Treatment
Chloroquine Phosphate: it is typically used for killing all sort of pathogenic parasites but is no longer effective for malaria because plasmodium has now become resistant to it.
Artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs): it is used as a first line treatment for treating malaria because it encapsulates number of drugs that act on the plasmodium with unique mechanisms.
Other Drugs: other drugs encompass
Combination of atovaquone and proguanil (Malarone)
Quinine sulfate (Qualaquin) with doxycycline (Vibramycin, Monodox, others)
Mefloquine
Primaquine phosphate (Miller et. al., 2002).
Organism V: Chlorella Vulgaris Algae
Table 5
Tabular representation of Chlorella vulgaris
Sr.
Properties
Description
1
Biological name
Chlorella vulgaris
2
Structure
It is spherical in shape 1-2 micrometer in diameter. It is single celled green algae found in water having chlorophyll a and b (Rashid et. al., 2014).
Image: microscopic view of Chlorella vulgaris
Image: diagrammatic representation of chlorella
3
Family & Genus
Chlorellaceae, Chlorella
5
Habitat
It is found in fresh water. Where it uses exhaled carbon dioxide of water animals for making food whereas provides them with fresh oxygen as an end-product of photosynthesis (Sinclair et. al., 1990).
6
Mode of transmission and
Virulence
Chlorella vulgaris is enriched with minerals, vitamins and basic nutrients that help growing and repairing human body cells. This is why it is used to make chlorella drug which is highly effective for humans. It is produced in Japan and used world-wide as a medical drug.
Its over-dosage can be harmful due to associated side effects. After drinking fresh water contaminated with this organism and high dose of chlorella drug, immune-compromised individuals may get (Sinclair et. al., 1990):
Green discoloration of stools
Abdominal cramping
Diarrhea
Nausea
Flatulence
Asthma or breathing problems
Photosensitivity
7
Treatment
Its treatment mostly includes drug treatment:
antithrombin alfa, antithrombin III, argatroban, bemiparin
bivalirudin, dabigatran, dalteparin, enoxaparin, fondaparinux, heparin, lepirudin, phenindione, protamine, tinzaparin, warfarin (Helle et. al., 2009)
8
Benefit
Chlorella drug is made from this organism. It is used (Helle et. al., 2009):
To treat Parkinson’s disease
Increasing tolerance for chemotherapy
It has anti-tumor abilities
Helps in shuttling toxins
Improves blood sugar and cholesterol level
References
Kaper, J. B., Nataro, J. P., (2004). Mobley H.L. Pathogenic Escherichia coli. Nat. Rev. Microbiol., 2, 123–140. doi: 10.1038/nrmicro818
Qadri, F., Svennerholm A. M., Faruque, A. S., Sack, R. B. (2005). Enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli in developing countries: Epidemiology, microbiology, clinical features, treatment, and prevention. Clin. Microbiol. Rev., 18, 465–483. doi: 10.1128/CMR.18.3.465-483.2005.
Weintraub, A., (2007). Enteroaggregative Escherichia coli: Epidemiology, virulence and detection. J. Med. Microbiol., 56, 4–8. doi: 10.1099/jmm.0.46930-0.
Albert, J., Navér, L., Böttiger, Y., et al. (2013). Prophylaxis and treatment of HIV-1 infection in pregnancy: Swedish recommendations 2013. Scand J Infect Dis, 46, 401–11.
Gazzard, B., Clumeck, N., d’Arminio Monforte, A., et al. (2008). Indicator disease-guided testing for HIV—the next step for Europe? HIV Med, 9(Suppl), 34–40.
Aral, S. O., Fenton, K. A., & Holmes, K. K. (2007). Sexually transmitted diseases in the USA: Temporal trends. Sexually Transmitted Infections, 83(4), 257–266.
Townsend, J. P., Adams, R. I., Nielsen, K. M., & Taylor, J. W (2006) Population structure and gene evolution in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. FEMS Yeast Research 6: 702–715.
Cimolai, N., Gill, M. J, Church, D. (1987) Saccharomyces cerevisiae fungemia: case report and review of the literature. Diagnostic Microbiology and Infectious Disease 8: 113–117
Wang, Q. M, Liu, W. Q., Liti, G., et al. (2012). Surprisingly diverged populations of Saccharomyces cerevisiae in natural environments remote from human activity. Mol Ecol., 21, 5404–17.
Miller, L. H., Baruch, D. I., Marsh, K., Doumbo, O. K. (2002). The pathogenic basis of malaria. Nature., 415, 673–679.
Pain, A., Hertz, F. C. (2009). Plasmodium genomics: latest milestone. Nat. Rev. Microbiol., 7, 180–181.
Miller, L. H., Aravind, L., Iyer, L. M., Wellems, T. E. (2003). Plasmodium biology: genomic gleanings. Cell., 115, 771–785.
Rashid, N. et al. (2014). Current status, issues and developments in microalgae derived biodiesel production. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 40, 760–778.
Sinclair, H. M. (1990). Essential fatty acids—a historical perspective. Biochemical Society Transactions, 18 (5), 756–761.
Halle, I., Janczyk, P., Freyer, G., Souffrant, W. B. (2009). Microalgae Chlorella vulgaris effectiveness. Biomed, 12, 5–13.
Images:
https://www.microscopemaster.com/e-coli-under-microscope.html
http://faculty.ccbcmd.edu/courses/bio141/lecguide/unit3/bacpath/diseases/blood/gnrod.html
https://www.avert.org/professionals/hiv-science/overview
https://redstaryeast.com/science-yeast/what-is-yeast/
https://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-3774-5052/diflucan-oral/fluconazole-oral/details
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmodium
https://algaeresearchsupply.com/products/algae-culture-chlorella-vulgaris
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261918083_Morphology_composition_production_processing_and_applications_of_Chlorella_vulgaris_A_review
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