Extraction of a Compact Colony‐Forming Active Substance from Staphylococcus aureus Strains

Abstract

In the present study, a compact colonyforming active substance from Staphylococcus aureus strains was found to be alkali-stable and suspected to be of a polysaccharide nature located on the cell surface.Recently, Forsum et al [1] postulated that compact colony forms of S. aureus strains in serum-soft agar (SSA) were the result of protein A, which reacted with the IgG globulin. Yoshida et al [4,5], however, observed that the compact colonyforming activities (CCFA) of S. aureus strains which were enhanced by alkali were decreased when the medium was made acid. This phenomenon suggested that protein A, which is rather acid-stable, may not be directly related to the CCFA of S. aureus in SSA. Attempts were made, therefore, to obtain a substance exhibiting the CCFA from S. aureus strains.S. aureus strain PS84, which showed high CCFA as described elsewhere [4], and the Wood 46 strain of S. aureus, which was deficient in protein A as noted by Lind et al [2], were used. Strains PS84 and Wood 46, both of the compact type, were cultured at 37 C overnight in brain heart infusion (BHI, Difco) dialysate medium which was supplemented with a 1/10 volume of 0.3 of Tris-hydrochloride buffer (pH 8.4). Cells were harvested by centrifugation and resuspended in 0.03 M of a similar buffered solution. They were treated with a sonic oscillator at 10 kc for 5 min. Viable cell numbers of the organisms were not diminishRequests for reprints should be addressed to Dr. Kosaku Yoshida,

Comparison of compact colony-forming activity and paracoagulation activity of strains ofStaphylococcus aureus in serum and plasmas of various animals

“…We have previously shown an alkali-dependent polysaccharide (substance 1), composed of galactose and 2-amino-2-deoxy-D-galacturonic acid, isolated from staphylococci cell surfaces to be involved in compact colony formation in SSA and paracoagulation (PC) with fibrinogen (Yoshida et al 1975(Yoshida et al , 1977(Yoshida et al , 1978Usui et al 1982;Ohtomo et al 1985). It was, therefore, also assumed that adsorption of the converting activity (change of diffuse to compact growth) in SSA of serum and fibrinogen could be interpreted as polymerization of fibrinogen, FDP and/or soluble fibrin monomer and that the relative compact colony-forming activity of the S. aureus strain would correlate with the relative activity of fibrinogen clotting by the compact colony-forming active substance (CCFAS) (Ohtomo and Yoshida 1981;Usui et al 1982).…”

Isolation of a Serologically Different Compact‐Colony‐Forming Active Substance from Strains of Staphylococcus aureus

“…Compact-colony-forming active substance (CCFAS) (9) was capable of clotting various species of animal plasmas (3,5). Also, with this substance, a disseminated intravascular coagulation was experimentally demonstrated in mice (15).…”