No abstract

Among the Gram-positive anaerobic bacteria associated with clinical infections, the Gram-positive anaerobic cocci (GPAC) are the most prominent and account for approximately 25-30% of all isolated anaerobic bacteria from clinical specimens. Still, routine culture and identification of these slowly growing anaerobes to the species level has been limited in the diagnostic laboratory, mainly due to the requirement of prolonged incubation times and time-consuming phenotypic identification. In addition, GPAC are mostly isolated from polymicrobial infections with known pathogens and therefore their relevance has often been overlooked. However, through improvements in diagnostic and in particular molecular techniques, the isolation and identification of individual genera and species of GPAC associated with specific infections have been enhanced. Furthermore, the taxonomy of GPAC has undergone considerable changes over the years, mainly due to the development of molecular identification methods. Existing species have been renamed and novel species have been added, resulting in changes of the nomenclature. As the abundance and significance of GPAC in clinical infections grow, knowledge of virulence factors and antibiotic resistance patterns of different species becomes more important. The present review describes recent advances of GPAC and what is known of the biology and pathogenic effects of Anaerococcus, Finegoldia, Parvimonas, Peptoniphilus and Peptostreptococcus, the most important GPAC genera isolated from human infections.

EDTA-derivatized deoxythymidine (dT-EDTA), incorporated into DNA and complexed to Fe2+ in the presence of dithiothreitol, is a widely used reagent for sequence-specific cleavage of duplex DNA. Using HPLC/electrospray mass spectrometry, we show that cleavage is specific to Fe2+, and no cleavage occurs when DNA-EDTA is complexed to other metal ions such as Ca2+, Mn2+, and Fe3+ even after many days. Because dT-EDTA can be incorporated at any desired position of a synthetic oligonucleotide, DNA-EDTA is ideally suited for the measurement of intermolecular paramagnetic relaxation enhancement effects between a paramagnetic ion chelated to DNA-EDTA and a bound protein. Measurements on the SRY/DNA-EDTA complex using two double-stranded oligonucleotides bearing dT-EDTA at opposite ends of the sequence indicate that intermolecular 1HN-T2 enhancement by chelated Mn2+ can be used to readily ascertain the polarity of protein binding to DNA and to derive quantitative long-range distance information for structure refinement. In the case of the SRY-DNA complex, excellent agreement between observed and calculated 1HN-T2 paramagnetic relaxation enhancement data can be achieved with insignificant shifts in the atomic coordinates ( approximately 0.25 A for all heavy atoms) while simultaneously satisfying all other experimental restraints. A unique feature of DNA-EDTA is that the relaxation enhancement effect can be tuned by judicious choice of the paramagnetic metal ion, thereby permitting a wide range of long-range intermolecular electron-proton distances, ranging from approximately 9 to 35 A, to be probed.