Effect of alcohols on the energy-production system of Bacillus subtilis and Escherichia coli

Yamashita, Masaru; Hijikata, Shigeki; Kuroyanagi, Takashi

doi:10.1016/0922-338x(93)90230-6

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“…There have been many studies and reviews (Casey et al, 1984;Damore et al, 1987;Ingram et al, 1984;van Uden, 1985 and1989;Yamashita, 1996) on the effects of ethanol on microorganisms, but the bactericidal mechanisms underlying the lethal effects of alcohol remain obscure. The authors have studied the effects of alcohols on microorganisms for many years (Yamashita, 1992(Yamashita, , 1993(Yamashita, and 1996 . The target microorganisms in these studies were Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, Lactobacillus casei, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Candida albicans, Aspergillus oryzae and Aspergillus niger.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of Alcohols on Escherichia coli Phages.

et al. 2000

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Escherichia coli T even phages were ethanol sensitive, whereas T odd phages were ethanol tolerant. The phagecidal activities of alcohols on ethanol sensitive phages (T even, X) were revealed to be in the order n-propanol > ethanol > methanol >> n-butanol >> n-hexanol >> noctanol. However, the those of alcohols on ethanol tolerant phages (T odd) were revealed to be in the order methanol>ethanol>n-propanol. The phagecidal activity of n-butanol (hydrophobic) increased when small amounts of hydrophilic methanol (10 and 20%, v/v), ethanol (10 and 20%, v/v) were added. The relative soluvbility curves of glucose plus Sudan III (hydrophobicity-hydrophilicity indication) were similar to the X phagecidal activity curves of ethanol solution. The denaturation of ethanol-sensitive phage proteins with ethanol solution (50 or 70%, v/v) on SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis was associated with a loss of the plaque-forming activity of the phage. These phenomena were not observed for the ethanoltolerant phages treated with ethanol solutions. The head proteins of ethanol-tolerant phage have a greater number of hydrophobic amino acids and fewer hydrophilic amino acids , whereas those of ethanol sensitive phage have a greater number of hydrophilic amino acids and fewer hydrophobic amino acids. From these data, we suggest that the hydrophobicityhydrophilicity balance of the alcohol solution and the phage surface proteins affects the loss of the plaque-forming activity of E. coli phages by alcohol.

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