Acinetobacter are a major concern because of their rapid development of resistance to a wide range of antimicrobials, and rapid profundity in transformation, surviving desiccation and persistinge in the environment for a very long time. The organisms are associated with bacteraemia, pulmonary infections, meningitis, diarrhea and notorious nosocomial infections with mortality rates of 20 to 60%. Transmission is via person-to-person contact, water and food contamination, and contaminated hospital equipment. The increasing virulence and rapid development of multidrug resistance by these organisms highlights the need to search for alternatives for chemotherapy. A poor understanding of the organisms and dearth of information about their occurrence especially in developing countries informed the need for this review paper.

No abstract

No abstract

The exposure of plants in open land and to various harsh environmental conditions means that they are at risk of being attacked by different types of microbial pathogens. For survival strategies, the plants interact with microbes in different ways, many of whom result in disease conditions. Because plants are sessile, it means that they must continuously integrate both biotic and abiotic signals from the environment which also means they must be able to distinguish those signals that are harmless from those that are potentially harmful. Consequently, plants have evolved a variety of adaptive mechanisms that provides them with basal immune natural protective measures to fight against these microbial pathogens, pests and other vertebrate diseases. Recognition of these pathogens is made possible by certain group of physiological elicitors that activates microbial or pathogen recognition proteins (MAMPs or PAMPs) of the basal immunity that enables the plant to recognize the invading pathogens. However, because the plant immune system lack circulating cells such as antibodies and macrophages of animals, the signal responses are partitioned both locally over several cell diameters and systemically in a limited sphere. Adequate understanding of the cell signaling mechanisms and the role of hormones in disease resistance will assist in developing a very effective control measure against plant diseases for more productive agricultural turn over.

The active principles of leaves and stem bark of Phyllanthus muellerianus (Kuntze) Excell (Euphobiaceae) were extracted with water and organic solvents (acetone and methanol) and tested for their antimicrobial activity against some pathogenic bacteria. Preliminary phytochemical screening showed that both the extracts contained tannins, flavonoids, saponins, alkaloids, and anthraquinones. Both the aqueous and methanol extracts of the leaves and stem bark showed high antibacterial activity against the test organisms. The least activity (6-mm zone of inhibition, MIC and MBC values of 625 and 312.5 µg/mL, respectively) by water leaf extracts was demonstrated against Staphylococcus, aureus, and the highest activity (18-mm zone of inhibition, MIC and MBC values of 625 µg/mL each) by water bark extracts and (22-mm zone of inhibition, MIC and MBC values of 625 and 156.3 µg/ML, respectively) by the methanol bark extracts was demonstrated against Pseudomonas aeruginosa at 5000 µg/Ml. The activity of the extracts was relatively stable at high temperatures and was enhanced at acidic pH. The plant can be used for the treatment of gastroenteritis, uretritis, otitis media, and wound infections.