The cultural characteristics and cellular fatty acid composition of 40 strains representing 7 species of Propionibacterium and of 9 cultures of anaerobic corynebacteria were studied. The cultures were characterized by means of 23 separate cultural and biochemical tests. Cultures of the two genera differed consistently in only two reactions; the propionibacteria did not produce indole or liquefy gelatin, whereas the anaerobic corynebacteria were consistently positive with these tests. The fatty acids were extracted from whole cells and examined as methyl esters by gas-liquid chromatography. The most abundant acid in the seven Propionibacterium species was a C15-saturated branched-chain acid which was present in both the isoand anteiso-form. Based on a comparison of the relative abundance of these isomers (i-C15 and a-C15), the species were separated into two groups. P. freudenreichii and P. shermanii (group one) were similar and contained the a-C15 isomer as the predominant acid. The i-C15 isomer was the most abundant acid in the second group (P. arabinosum, P. jensenii, P. pentosaceum, P. thoenii, and P. zeae). The fatty acid profiles of the anaerobic corynebacteria were somewhat similar to those of the second group of propionibacteria, but were distinct from the profiles of P. freudenreichii and P. shermanii. The addition of branched-chain amino acids (L-leucine and Lisoleucine) to the growth medium increased the synthesis of the specific fatty acid(s) structurally related to the added amino acid. Members of the genus Propionibacterium are taxonomically very similar to anaerobic species of Corynebacterium. C. acnes, one of the most frequently encountered anaerobic species in clinical materials (5, 13), has been tentatively assigned to Propionibacterium by some workers on the basis of similar biochemical and morphological characteristics (3, 7). Others, however, have reported that C. acnes is sufficiently different in morphological and physiological features, and in deoxyribonucleic acid composition, to warrant its separation from the genus Propionibacterium (14, 16, 17). Previous work from this laboratory has shown that the relationship of C. acnes to the genus Propionibacterium extends beyond morphological and cultural similarities to include common cellular constituents such as fatty acids. We found that the fatty acid profiles of C. acnes were essentially identical to those of P. freudenreichii and P. shermanii, and that the three species were characterized by the presence of large amounts of a saturated C15 branched-chain fatty acid (10). Further study (9), however, indicated that C. acnes could be distinguished from P. freudenreichii and P. shermanii on the basis of the point of branching of the methyl group in the C15 fatty acid chain; C. acnes contained 13-methyltetradecanoic acid (i-C15) as the most abundant acid, whereas 12-methyltetradecanoic acid (a-C,5) was the most abundant acid in the two Propionibacterium species. Data on the cultural characteristics and fatty acid composition of additional cultur...

Few studies have been conducted to determine the lipid composition of Listeria monocytogenes cells. Implications of the importance of this class of compounds in the pathogenesis of listeriosis was suggested by the early study of Stanley (5), who found a lipid component from bacterial cells that incited monocyte production in monogastric animals. The chemical nature of this component was not determined, but it was readily extracted with chloroform and later was suggested by Keeler and Gray (1) to be a constituent of the bacterial cell wall or membrane. It is possible that the monocyte-producing activity of the lipid component could be due to the nature of its fatty acid moiety which may be manifest by uncommon or previously unknown fatty acids. This study was initiated to provide basic information of the cellular fatty acids of L. monocytogenes. This report describes the results from 33 strains representing ten serological types of L. monocytogenes (J. Donker-Voet, Proc. Third Intern. Symp. Listeriosis, Rijka Instituut Voor De Volksgezondheid,

Alteration of the rabbit serum lipids as a result of three bacterial infections was studied by quantitative thin-layer and gas-liquid chromatography. Anthrax infection slightly changed the serum lipid. Cholesterol did not change, though free fatty acids, triglycerides, and cholesteryl esters doubled, and lecithin increased threefold. Tularemia infection produced drastic changes in the serum lipid content of rabbits, in

EVIDENCE is rapidly accumulating which indicates that gas liquid chromatography (GLC) is a useful aid in the identification and classification of microorganisms (Abel, de Schmertzing, and Peterson, 1963; Reiner, 1965; Henis, Gould, and Alexander, 1966). Recently, several workers have analysed microorganisms for fatty acids by GLC and, by comparing their profiles, have established some useful taxonomic relationships (Moss and Lewis, 1967; Yamakawa and Ueta, 1964). The present study describes the fatty acid composition of fifteen different cultivable treponemes. Material and methods The following cultures were obtained, both as lyophilized and as freshly cultivated treponemes, from the Venereal

A method for the formation of the trimethylsilyl (TMS) derivatives of the wholecell hydrolysate of bacteria was developed. The TMS derivatives were examined by gas-liquid chromatography. TMS profiles of various bacteria at the genus and species level were compared. Differences in TMS profiles of Listeria, Neisseria, and Clostridium were significant as were differences between the TMS profiles of C. perfringens and C. sporogenes. Two types of C. perfringens, two serotypes of L. monocytogenes, and one culture of C. sporogenes and N. meningitidis were studied. The possible application of TMS profiles as an aid in differentiating closely related organisms which are troublesome to separate by conventional means is discussed.