Work within the Coordinated Program on Bacterial Leaching of Uranium Ores. Immunological Identification of Thiobacillus Ferrooxidans and Thiobacillus Thiooxidans. Final Report for the Period 15 May 1973 - 31 January 1978

摘要

Little is known of the antigenic structure of Thiobacillus. In the composition of the antigens of gram negative bacteria the polysaccharide moiety endows some specificity permitting immunological identification. The report considers work on attempts to isolate the type-specific component from T. thiooxidans and T ferrooxidans. The fractionation procedures presented suggest that the presence of one or a few such type-specific major protein antigen fractions from both of the T. ferrooxidans and the T. thiooxidans seems to be originated from the cytoplasm of the bacteria, since it is believed that the glycoprotein fractions which was derived from the cell wall are the common antigenic fraction between the T. ferrooxidans and the T. thiooxidans, respectively. In this regard, it is of great interest that the T. ferrooxidans or the T. thiooxidans appears not to have the type-specific antigens on their LPS or polysaccharide moiety in contrast to the other gram-negative bacteria. Thus, it is strongly believed that the envelopes of these bacteria contain both glycoproteins bearing common antigenicity, since the T. ferrooxidans and the T. thiooxidans have a structually different type-specific antigen moiety according to the results polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. (Atomindex citation 09:414427)