Objective This study was undertaken to characterise the dominant species of Lactobacillus colonising the vagina of healthy pregnant women, to examine some of their phenotypic and genotypic properties, and to gain a better understanding of the potential role of species, which might be associated with infection-free status.Design A prospective descriptive cohort study.Setting Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Medical University of Vienna and Medical School, Vienna, Austria.Sample A total of 200 women in the late first trimester of pregnancy without clinical signs of vaginal infection were included in the study. Of these, 126 women were found to have a normal vaginal flora based on Gram stain.Methods Culture probes from those 126 women were further processed for identification of Lactobacillus species. Overall, 168 colonies from 84 women were identified as belonging to the Lactobacillus genus. Based on the combined results of microbiological methods and genus-specific, multiplex, and species-specific polymerase chain reaction, lactobacilli were recovered from 72 women.Main outcome measures Identification of Lactobacillus species of the vaginal flora of healthy pregnant women.Results The most frequently occurring species were Lactobacillus crispatus and Lactobacillus gasseri, followed by Lactobacillus jensenii and Lactobacillus rhamnosus.Conclusions Our results may have implications on the composition and on the use of Lactobacillus preparations for the prevention of recurrent vaginal infection.

Certain properties relevant to probiotic action, e.g. resistance to acid, bile tolerance, adhesive properties, antibacterial activity, and antibiotic susceptibility were investigated of lactobacilli isolated from four kinds of Thai traditional fermented foods. Media of pH = 2.0-7.0 and bile salt concentrations of 0.3-1.0%were used as stress conditions. The adhesive properties were assessed by determination of bacterial hydrophobicity. Antibacterial activity of the probiotic lactobacilli was determined by means of the spot-on-lawn method. Among 563 isolates, only 3 strains (two from fermented pork and one from fermented tea leaves) showed extremely high survival rates under stress caused by acid or bile salts. The identification by PCR techniques revealed that these three strains were Lactobacillus fermentum. The strains from fermented pork showed higher adhesive potential than those from fermented tea leaves. The three strains inhibited test pathogenic bacteria to different extents. They were sensitive to chloramphenicol, quinupristin, erythromycin, kanamycin linezolid, rifampicin, streptomycin, and tetracycline but resistant to ciprofloxacin and vancomycin.

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Miang is a kind of traditional fermented tea leaves, widely consumed in northern Thailand as a snack. It contains several kinds of Lactobacilli spp. The aim of this study was to isolate strains of Lactobacillus fermentum from miang and to investigate their antibacterial and antioxidant activities. The agar spot and well assays were used for determination of antibacterial power. The antibacterial mechanism was investigated by cell morphologic change under scanning electron microscope (SEM). Antioxidant activity was studied by means of free radical scavenging and ferric reducing power assays. The acid and bile screening tests indicated that L. fermentum FTL2311 and L. fermentum FTL10BR presented antibacterial activity against several pathogenic bacteria: Listeria monocytogenes DMST 17303, Salmonella Typhi DMST 5784, Shigella sonnei DMST 561 (ATCC 11060) and Staphylococcus aureus subsp. aureus DMST 6512 (ATCC 6538Ptm). The results from SEM suggested that the antibacterial action was due to the destruction of cell membrane which consequently caused the pathogenic cell shrinking or cracking. The antioxidant study suggested that both L. fermentum FTL2311 and L. fermentum FTL10BR strains could liberate certain substances that possessed antioxidant activity expressed as trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity (TEAC) and equivalent concentration (EC) values for free radical scavenging and reducing mechanisms, respectively. The supernatant of L. fermentum FTL2311 broth revealed TEAC and EC values of 22.54±0.12 and 20.63±0.17 >M.mg-1 respectively, whereas that of L. fermentum FTL10BR yielded TEAC and EC values of 24.09±0.12 and 21.26±0.17 >M.mg-1 respectively. These two strains isolated from miang present high potential as promising health-promoting probiotics.

Antimicrobials are commonly used to prevent and treat disease in the ornamental fish industry. However, the indiscriminate and comprehensive overuse of unregulated antimicrobials without appropriate diagnostic examination could contribute to the development of antimicrobial-resistant strains of bacterial pathogens. Moreover, human infections caused by pathogens transmitted from fish or the aquatic environment are quite common. The frequent detection of antimicrobial resistance in ornamental fish and their environments are inevitable so as to decrease the transfer of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria from aquatic sources to other environments. This study evaluated the prevalence of common bacteria species and the antimicrobial susceptibility profile in ornamental fish that were sold in an ornamental fish shop in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Aeromonas spp. were the most dominant of the isolated species from the ornamental fish samples and accounted for 68.09% of the total. Other species detected included Vibrio spp., Pseudomonas spp., and Citrobacter spp. A high percentage of resistance to amoxicillin (93.75%), oxytetracycline (79.69%), and erythromycin (75.00%) was observed among the Aeromonas spp. The antimicrobial resistance information for ornamental fish is very limited, and the results from this study indicate that the Aeromonas spp. are highly resistant to several important antibiotics. The results suggest that additional steps should be taken to educate store owners to reduce the indiscriminate use of these antibiotics to decrease the antimicrobial resistance in ornamental fish to potentially improve public health.

In this study, Sesbania grandiflora, a plant in the Leguminosae family, was investigated for its antibacterial activities. The agar well diffusion assay as well as the agar and broth dilution assays were used for determination of antibacterial activities. The crude ethanolic extracts obtained from different parts of this plant exhibited different potent activities. The stem bark has the most potential to yield an extract with the highest antibacterial action. The fractionation of the stem bark with different solvents indicated that the fractionated extracts obtained from ethyl acetate or butanol possessed the most pronounced antibacterial activity. The kinetic study of bactericidal activities revealed that the butanol fractionated extract of the stem bark was effective against Gram negative bacteria. This study suggests that the stem bark of S. grandiflora contains promising antibacterial substances for clinical purposes.

The aim of the present study was to develop a microemulsion (ME) containing Alpinia galanga oil (AGO), 1,8-cineole (C), or methyl eugenol (M) as an active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) for enhancing their antimicrobial activities. Agar diffusion, broth microdilution, and killing kinetics were used for antimicrobial evaluations. The ME composed of 30% API, 33.4% Tween 80, 16.6% ethanol, and 20% water appeared as translucent systems with droplet size and polydispersity index of 101.1 ± 1.3 nm and 0.3 ± 0.1, 80.9 ± 1.1 nm and 0.4 ± 0.1, and 96.6 ± 2.0 nm and 0.2 ± 0.1 for ME-AGO, ME-C, and ME-M, respectively. These ME formulations showed minimum bacterial concentrations of 3.91–31.25 µg/mL and 50% fungal inhibition concentrations of 1.83 ± 0.27–0.46 ± 0.13 µg/mL, 2–4 times stronger, and faster kinetic killing rate than their respective API alone. Keeping the ME formulations at 4 C, 25 C, and 40 C for 12 weeks did not affect their activities against fungi and Gram-negative bacteria, but the high temperature of 40 C decreased their activities against Gram-positive bacteria. It is concluded that ME is a promising delivery system for AGO and its major compounds to enhance their water miscibility and antimicrobial activities.