United States or Ireland ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Our minds fall very readily under the spell of such unmitigated words as Purity and Chastity. Only death beyond decay, absolute non-existence, can be Pure and Chaste. Life is impurity, fact is impure. Everything has traces of alien matter; our very health is dependent on parasitic bacteria; the purest blood in the world has a tainted ancestor, and not a saint but has evil thoughts.
This observation, we may remark, furnishes one of the best proofs that can be adduced against the spontaneous generation of vibrios or bacteria, since it is probable that the same observation applies to bacteria.
If a difference of action in certain reagents, in ammonia, for example, were sufficient to determine the limits of the animal and vegetable kingdoms, might we not argue that there must be a very great and natural difference between moulds and bacteria, inasmuch as the presence of a small quantity of acid in the nutritive medium facilitates the growth and propagation of the former, whilst it is able to prevent the life of bacteria and vibrios?
The opsonins, for example, those substances which butter the bacteria so that the appetite of the white cells for them is properly roused, are mobilized by thyroid feeding or injection. Other substances in the blood which destroy and dissolve bacteria are also increased.
The general condition of the patient must be improved by tonics, good food, and favourable hygienic surroundings. In some cases potassium iodide acts beneficially. Actinomycosis is a chronic disease due to the action of an organism somewhat higher in the vegetable scale than ordinary bacteria the streptothrix actinomyces or ray fungus.
Careful examinations have shown that under normal conditions, which of course include pregnancy, disease-producing bacteria are absent from the vagina; in this respect the vagina is even cleaner than the skin, for disease-producing bacteria are present on the surface of the body.
As compared with the increased value of the plants, the cost of the nitrate is not worth taking into consideration." As a means of fertilization without the use of artificial fertilizer, soil inoculation has come. It has grown out of the discovery of the dependence of leguminous plants on bacteria which live on their roots.
The special features of their vegetation are best seen when substances which also contain other forms of bacteria are taken e. g., the intestinal contents or choleraic evacuations mixed with moistened earth or linen and kept damp.
"Indeed, it is surprising," he resumed thoughtfully, "how many an innocent substance can be changed by bacteria into a virulent poison. In fact our poisons and our drugs are in many instances the close relations of harmless compounds that represent the intermediate steps in the daily process of metabolism." "Then," I put in, "the toxin was produced by germs, after all?"
Other cheeses: The various cheeses on the market are made principally from ripened curds, with which more or less fat has been mixed. The ripening is a form of decay, and it is no exaggeration to say that some of the very ripe cheeses on the market are rotten. The flavors are due to ferments, molds and bacteria, which split up the proteins and the fats.
Word Of The Day