In article <Pine.SOL.3.91.941110122850.22688B-100000 at isnet> bmorrell at ISNET.IS.WFU.EDU (Bob Morrell) writes:
>From: bmorrell at ISNET.IS.WFU.EDU (Bob Morrell)
>Subject: Re: sporulating GNR
>Date: 10 Nov 1994 09:52:57 -0800
>On 10 Nov 1994 PWILLIAM at lear.sinclair.edu wrote:
>> A colleague read about a soon-to-be-released book by Laurie Garrett,
>> "The Coming Plague", which claims that strains of E. coli, V. cholerae,
>> and Legionella are able to undergo sporulation.
>Old work performed at Rita Colwell's lab at the Univ. of Maryland suggest
Vibrio (at least) can form viable but apparently non-cultivable forms which
apparently are likened to spores. From what I've read genes encoding
spore formation, i.e. spo genes (or least homologs of them) have been detected
in E. coli and Vibrio spp. but they do not seem to be expressed under
"normal" growth conditions. In any case spores can come in many different
forms with various degrees of "toughness". In terms of public health, the
spores of such bugs as Bacillus anthracis (anthrax) and Clostridium botulinum
(botulism) are the biggest concern.
John Bowman, Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville
