Gut microbiota plays an important role in host health and nutrient digestion of animals. Probiotics have become one of effective alternatives to antibiotics enhancing animal health and performance through modulating gut microbiota. Previously, our research demonstrated that dietary Enterococcus Faecalis UC-100 substituting antibiotics enhanced growth and health of weaned pigs. To investigate th...

Due to the emergence of resistance toward current antibiotics, there is a pressing need to develop the next generation of antibiotics as therapeutics against infectious and opportunistic diseases of microbial origins. The shikimate pathway is exclusive to microbes, plants and fungi, and hence is an attractive and logical target for development of antimicrobial therapeutics. The Gram-positive co...

Background Alcaligenes faecalis (A.faecalis) is a Gramnegative, rod-shaped, motile, oxidase, catalase and citrate positive obligate aerobe that is commonly found in the environment. A. faecalis is the most frequently isolated member of family Alcaligenaceae in the clinical laboratory. Infections caused by A. faecalis are opportunistic and are acquired from moist items such as nebulizers, respir...

UNLABELLED Enterococcus faecalis is a Gram-positive bacterium that natively colonizes the human gastrointestinal tract and opportunistically causes life-threatening infections. Multidrug-resistant (MDR) E. faecalis strains have emerged, reducing treatment options for these infections. MDR E. faecalis strains have large genomes containing mobile genetic elements (MGEs) that harbor genes for anti...

Enterococcus faecalis is an opportunistic pathogen that causes serious infections in humans and animals and is also an important bacterium for dairy and probiotic supplement production. Therefore, bacteriophages infecting E. faecalis may be useful for phage therapy against multidrug-resistant strains or may threaten industrial fermentation. We isolated a virulent Siphoviridae bacteriophage, BC-...

Enterococcus faecalis is an important agent of endocarditis and urinary tract infections, which occur frequently in hospitals. Antimicrobial therapy is complicated by the emergence of drug-resistant strains, which contribute significantly to mortality associated with E. faecalis infection. In this issue of the JCI, Nallapareddy and colleagues report that E. faecalis produces pili on its surface...

Immunoelectrophoresis revealed in phenol extracts from S. faecalis and S. faecium a mixture of free and lipid-bound teichoic acids, both reactive with Group D antisera. In phenol extracts from S. suis only lipid-bound teichoic acid, also reactive with Group D antiserum, was seen. This difference probably accounts for the low yield of Group D antigen from S. suis as compared with S. faecalis and...

This study was performed to investigate the relationship between the abundance of pathogenic gut microbes in Chinese patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and disease severity.We collected clinical data and fecal samples from 47 therapy-naive Chinese patients with ulcerative colitis (UC), 67 patients with Crohn disease (CD), and 48 healthy volunteers. Bacteria levels of Fusobacterium s...

Sixteen isolates of Enterococcus faecalis were recovered from retail poultry samples (seven chickens and nine turkeys) purchased from grocery stores in the greater Washington, D.C., area. PCR for known streptogramin resistance genes identified vat(E) in five E. faecalis isolates (three isolates from chickens and two isolates from turkeys). The vat(E) gene was transmissible on a ca. 70-kb plasmi...