How do you identify mycobacteria?

How do you identify mycobacteria?

Traditionally, mycobacteria are identified by phenotypic methods, based on culture, such as morphological characteristics, growth rates, preferred growth temperature, pigmentation and on a series of biochemical tests.

How many Mycobacterium species are there?

Currently, there are over 170 recognized species of Mycobacterium, the only genus in the family Mycobacteriaceae. Organisms belonging to this genus are quite diverse with respect to their ability to cause disease in humans; some are strict pathogens, while others are opportunistic pathogens or nonpathogenic.

How Mycobacterium is differentiated and identified from the other bacteria?

Mycobacteria differ so strongly from other bacteria in their cell wall architecture and metabolism that they require specific diagnostic tests, i.e. stains, culture media, identification methods.

What family is Mycobacterium?

MycobacteriaceaeMycobacterium / Family

What is the difference between mycobacteria and bacteria?

Mycobacteria have an outer membrane. They do not have capsules, and most do not form endospores. The distinguishing characteristic of all Mycobacterium species is that the cell wall is thicker than in many other bacteria, which is hydrophobic, waxy, and rich in mycolic acids/mycolates.

How can you tell the difference between mycobacteria and Gram-positive bacteria?

By contrast, Gram-positive bacteria lack an outer membrane but have a thick peptidoglycan cell wall outside of the cell membrane32 (Fig. 1b). In mycobacteria, peptidoglycan is covalently attached to arabinogalactan, which in turn is attached to mycolic acids.

How can you differentiate Mycobacterium tuberculosis and other Mycobacterium species?

Real-time PCR has been used to differentiate members of the M. tuberculosis complex from other mycobacteria (12, 13, 17). These assays, however, either detect only M. tuberculosis or require additional hybridization probe sets to detect other mycobacteria (12, 13, 17).

How is Mycobacterium tuberculosis arranged?

Mycobacterium tuberculosis is a acid fast bacteria, which can form acid-stable complexes when certain arylmethane dyes are added. (4) All species of mycobacteria have ropelike structures of peptidoglycan that are arranged in such a way to give them properties of an acid fast bacteria.

Is mycobacteria Gram-positive or negative?

Gram-positive
Mycobacteria are Gram-positive, catalase positive, non-motile, non-spore forming rod-shaped bacteria (0.2–0.6 μm wide and 1.0–10 μm long). The colony morphology of mycobacteria varies with some species growing as rough or smooth colonies.

What is the taxonomy of Mycobacterium tuberculosis?

Detail of structure of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis

What are the characteristics of Mycobacterium?

Mycobacteria are Gram-positive, catalase positive, non-motile, non-spore forming rod-shaped bacteria (0.2–0.6 μm wide and 1.0–10 μm long). The colony morphology of mycobacteria varies with some species growing as rough or smooth colonies. Colony colour ranges from white to orange or pink (Iivanainen, 1999).

Is Mycoplasma and mycobacteria the same?

The shorthand for these two diseases of cattle is the same, but they completely different bacteria: Mycobacterium bovis and Mycoplasma bovis. Every bacteria has a specific name, so that we can identify them better – the “surname” (in this case Mycobacterium and Mycoplasma) and then a “first name” (bovis).

Are mycobacteria Gram-positive or negative?

What is the Mycobacterium structure?

The mycobacterial cell envelope comprises four main layers: (i) the plasma membrane or inner membrane (IM), (ii) the peptidoglycan–arabinogalactan complex (AGP), (iii) an asymmetrical outer membrane (OM) or ‘mycomembrane’, that is covalently linked to AGP via the mycolic acids, and (iv) the outermost capsule [24] ( …