Bacillus thuringiensis is an important entomopathogenic bacterium belongs to the Bacillus cereus group, which also includes B. anthracis and B. cereus. Several genomes of phages originating from this group had been sequenced, but no genome of Siphoviridae phage from B. thuringiensis has been reported. We recently sequenced and analyzed the genome of a novel phage, BtCS33, from a B. thuringiensi...

Bacillus cereus is an uncommon but potentially serious bacterial pathogen causing infections of the bloodstream, lungs, and central nervous system of preterm neonates. A case of bacteremia caused by B. cereus in a 19-day-old preterm neonate who was successfully treated with vancomycin, tobramycin, meropenem, and clindamycin is described. Implications for the diagnostic laboratory and clinicians...

A guinea pig skin assay was developed as a measure of ileal loop fluid-inducing factor in the rabbit and possibly of the causative principle of Bacillus cereus food poisoning. A green or bloody necrotic reaction was produced in the guinea pig skin by injection of culture filtrates from 21 of 24 B. cereus strains tested, and by no other Bacillus species tested except for the closely related B. t...

The interaction between the surface of stainless steel and Bacillus cereus was studied in terms of the characteristics of interfacial interaction determined from the measurement of the contact angle of the surface of B. cereus and stainless steel in the presence or absence of B. cereus adherence. The microtopographies and the roughness of the surface of stainless steel and stainless steel adher...

Programmed cell death in bacteria is generally associated with two-component toxin-antitoxin systems. The SpoIIS toxin-antitoxin system, consisting of a membrane-bound SpoIISA toxin and a small, cytosolic antitoxin SpoIISB, was originally identified in Bacillus subtilis. In this work we describe the Bacillus cereus SpoIIS system which is a three-component system, harboring an additional gene sp...

Nine strains belonging to Bacillus cereus group has been isolated from food and environmental samples. Their taxonomic position was confirmed by RFLP analysis of 16S rRNA gene digested with TaqI. The detection of DNA sequences encoding the hemolysin BL complex and enterotoxin NHE, was studied in Bacillus sp. isolates. Set of primers was used to amplify fragment of hblD gene by PCR. For the dete...

Six strains of Bacillus cereus exhibiting antifungal activity were isolated from local environment and optimized for growth conditions. The isolates appeared neutrophiles, grew best at aeration and were represented by thermophiles and mesophiles. Growth inhibition zones of varying diameters were observed when the isolates were tested against Saccharomyces cerevisiae on nutrient agar. Largest in...

Bacillus cereus is typically considered a blood culture contaminant; however, its presence in blood cultures can indicate true bacteremia. We report 4 episodes of B. cereus bacteremia in 3 persons who inject drugs. Multilocus sequence typing showed that the temporally associated infections were caused by unrelated clones.

Forty-five strains, representing 18 species of the genus Bacillus, were surveyed for production of hemolysin against rabbit erythrocytes. Broth cultures of B. cereus, B. alvei, and B. laterosporus contained lysins that closely resembled streptolysin O. B. subtilis and a single strain of B. cereus may produce lysins having characteristics different from those of streptolysin O.