Demonstration of Streptococcus mutans with a cell wall polysaccharide specific to a new serotype, k, in the human oral cavity.

ABSTRACT: Streptococcus mutans organisms are occasionally isolated from the blood of patients with infective endocarditis, though the mechanisms of invasion and survival remain to be elucidated. Two of four blood isolates from patients with bacteremia or infective endocarditis (strains TW295 and TW871) were serologically untypeable by immunodiffusion testing, which was due to a lack of the glucose side chain of the serotype-specific polysaccharide antigen of S. mutans. Immunodiffusion analyses using antisera against these strains demonstrated that 2 of 100 isolates from 100 subjects showed a positive reaction, while further analysis of 2500 isolates from 50 subjects revealed that all 50 isolates from a single subject were not reactive with anti-c, -e, and -f antisera, though they were reactive with

SUBMITTER: Nakano K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC321689 | biostudies-literature | 2004 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature