W3 13 Intro To Microbial World Flashcards
What can cause infection?
Bacteria, viruses, fungi, parasites, Protozoa, helminths
What is a parasite?
Organisms that live on/in another host and derive nutrition without benefit to the host
What are helminth?
Worms, parasitic eg tapeworms
What are Protozoa?
Single cells eukaryotic cells. Many types, can be parasites. Can be visible with naked eye.
What is a major insect borne parasite?
Plasmodium - cause of malaria, transmitted by mosquitos
Examples of food borne parasites
Giardia, cryptosporidium, Taenia
Describe the differences between prokaryotes and eukaryotes
Eukaryotes - DNA in nucleus, DNA has histones, organelles are membrane-enclosed, cell walls of present are chemically simple, cell division by mitosis
Prokaryotes - DNA not enclosed by a membrane, lacks membrane-enclosed organelles, cell walls made from peptidoglycan, divide by binary fission
Are bacteria or viruses bigger?
Bacteria are wayyyyyyy bigger
How can you classify bacteria?
Via gram stain
Morphology
Oxygen requirments
Describe the difference in cell walls of gram positive and gram negative bacteria
Gram positive - many layers of peptidoglycan = thick cell wall. No outer membrane
Gram negative - thin peptidoglycan layer embedded between an inner and outer membrane
How does dye distinguish from gram positive and gram negative?
Blue or purple dye from crystal violate penetrates the many peptidoglycan layers of gram positive bacteria and is held within these layers. In gram negatives, the stain is washed away by a decolorisation step. The counter stain which is pink or red will colourise those bacteria.
Positive = blue/purple
Negative = red
Give examples of gram positive bacteria
Staphylococci
Streptococci
Lactobacilli
Clostridia
Give some examples of gram negative bacteria
Enterobacteriaceae
P gingivalis
F nucleatum
Stages for the diagnosis of infectious disease
Symptomatic patient —> clinical examination —> presumptive clinical diagnosis —> tests selected by primary care clinician —> sample/specimen collection —> lab tests —> definitive diagnosis —> drug tests —> treatment/therapy —> asymptomatic patient
What different diagnostic laboratory tests are there?
Direct examination/microscopy —> stain
Culture —> biochemical analysis; toxin testing
Antibody detection methods —> agglutination; rapid test; ELISA
Genetic —> hybridisation; PCR; RT-PCR
How can viruses be detected via serology?
- detection of virus particles
- detection of viral antigens
- anti-viral antibody detection
- viral nucleic acid detection
- cytological or histological examination of cells from site of infection
What is ELISA?
Used to detect viruses and bacterial cell surface antigens or toxins
May be qualitative or quantitative - blood sample tested
Describe some characteristics of fungi
Eukaryotic, single or multicellular, cell wall contains chitin
What fungi causes oral thrush/candidiasis?
Candida (albicans) infects the mucosal membranes of the mouth
When is oral thrush common?
In immunodeficiency patients (and risk factor for systemic spread)
Requires anti fungal treatment
Where is Cryptococcus neoformans (yeast) clinical seen?
Meningitis in HIV, cancer patients, pulmonary disease like pneumonia
Can have oral manifestations
What is the predisposition for the manifestation of cryptococcus neoformans?
Defects in cell-mediated immunity (low CD4+ T cells)
Where is cryptococcus neoformans found?
Environmental organism: soil, bird droppings
It is an important opportunistic pathogen
What is aspergillus fumigatus?
Filamentous fungus found in ubiquitous spores - soil, dust (building work etc)
What clinical illnesses can aspergillus fumigatus cause?
Sinusitis, endocarditis (post valve surgery)
Pulmonary: asthma etc
Systemic: lung, renal, cerebral (in immunocompromised)
Treatment for aspergillus fumigatus
IV voriconasole or Amphoteracin B (Liposomal)
Properties of viruses
Do not grow or divide independently
Are obligate intracellular parasites
Contain DNA or RNA (never both)
Unable to generate ATP
Unable to synthesis proteins independently
Are acellular (and not bound by a cytoplasmic membrane)
What is the structure of a virus
Not bound by a cytoplasmic membrane
Often possess a proteinaceous capsid which surrounds the nucleic acid (nucleocaspid)
In some cases viruses are surrounded by a lipid membrane envelope derived from the host