I found a new bacterium. Can I name it Cyndi Wang？

Original Tommy guoke

If you don’t know the friend below, call him "long-haired black pig".

Actually, it’s called curly boar, wikimedia commons/ Magalh?es

We might as well call the following clump of plants "Carex macrophylla".

Actually, it’s bottle grass in the mountains, wikimedia commons/ NoahElhardt

Even without professional knowledge, we can easily name animals and plants that are visible to the naked eye according to their appearance, such as small red flowers, big orange cats and so on.

But there are many microbes in the world! They are invisible to the naked eye, and their features are not as obvious as those of animals and plants. How do you name them? Is it like the joke that the newly discovered bacteria are named after their sweetheart?

Have a surname and be famous.

The long-haired black pig and the big tube grass mentioned just now are nicknames casually, but in formal occasions, we should use scientific names and big names.

The scientific name of a species is written in Latin and consists of two parts: the first half is the generic name, which is equivalent to the surname of a person, and a surname is the family name; The latter part is a name, which is equivalent to a person’s name and is used to identify an individual.

In order to explain this matter more interestingly, we also drew a cartoon. Welcome to come in and have a look →.

Theoretically, if a scholar discovers a new kind of bacteria/fungi, as long as it doesn’t duplicate the existing bacterial name, it won’t cause ambiguity, and it doesn’t violate the law, morality, public order and good customs. Basically, he can name whatever he thinks of, and the naming right belongs to the scholar who first reported it.

It’s kind of cool to think about it.

The first rule of naming: look at the face

Naming according to the shape is the most common naming method, which is very intuitive! The most representative is the famous Staphylococcus aureus.

The scientific name of Staphylococcus aureus is Staphylococcus Aureus. It is a string of Latin names, meaning "bunches of grapes" and "round fruits". Do you think it is as round as a grape?

Figure CDC

And its "name" means "golden yellow" The photo above has been dyed, and it is actually golden in a Petri dish:

Figure wikimedia commons

Staphylococcus aureus in "Working Cell" and "Working Cell"

This naming method is as straightforward as a boy who is 1.9 meters tall is really called a "tall man".

They also belong to this category.

Staphylococcus haemolyticus: This bacterium can make hemolysis circle around the colony on the culture medium containing blood components.

Bacillus cereus: The colony is rough in appearance and resembles solidified wax drops, which often causes food poisoning.

Fusarium spp.: The spores of this kind of fungi are crescent-shaped and resemble sickle, which can cause plant diseases and infect people or animals.

Naming Rule 2: Check the account.

We often use place names to identify a person, such as Beijingers, Asians and Earthlings. This method can also be used on microorganisms: see where it is.

In 2001, the Medical College of Hong Kong University reported a brand-new pathogenic bacteria for the first time. The strain was isolated from the blood and pleural pus of a patient with liver cirrhosis admitted to hospital due to high fever and shortness of breath [7]. Because it was isolated for the first time in Hong Kong, it was named Laribacter hongkongensis.

Some bacteria have a more unique "hukou", for example, Escherichia coli, and the hukou: large intestine.

Escherichia coli wikimedia commons/ Eric Erbe magnified by 10000 times

The official name of Escherichia coli is Escherichia coli, and it is worth mentioning that "Ehi" comes from a person’s name.

In 1885, German doctor Theodor Escherich isolated the bacterium from feces. To commemorate the great discovery of Dr. Escherich, in 1919, the strain was officially named "Escherichia" [6].

They also belong to this category.

Nocardia cyriacigeorgica in St. George’s Church: The bacterium was first isolated from the mural of the church. Because the church is located in a small town called Gelsenkirchen in Germany, it is sometimes translated as Nocardia Gelsenkirchen.

Leifsonia shinshuensis: "shinshu" refers to shinshu, Japan, and is the old name of Nagano, where it was first discovered.

Bacillus nanhaiensis: It was first isolated from oysters collected in the South China Sea by Chinese scholars in 2011, and later it was renamed as "Fictitious nanhaiensis".

Rule 3 of Naming: Name by "sin"

All children in our country should be vaccinated with DTP, in which "white" refers to diphtheria, a once murderous disease. This disease can cause myocarditis or systemic poisoning, and most patients will have a gray-white film on their throat, so this disease is called "diphtheria".

A grayish white membrane grows near the tonsils of diphtheria patients. wikimedia commons/Dileepunnikri.

The initiator of diphtheria is a long rod-shaped bacterium, which is also called "Corynebacterium diphtheriae".

They also belong to this category.

Rabies Virus: the pathogen of rabies; In addition to infecting humans, it can also infect mammals such as dogs, wolves and cats.

Yersinia pestis: the pathogen of plague (Black Death); The strain can infect rodents, mainly rodents, and spread to humans through rat fleas.

Streptococcus pneumoniae: a kind of cocci arranged in a short necklace, which often causes pneumonia in children and the elderly.

Neisseria gonorrhoeae: Neisseria gonorrhoeae, formerly known as Neisseria gonorrhoeae, can cause purulent infection of urogenital system and is one of the common sexually transmitted diseases, commonly known as gonorrhea.

Naming Rule 4: Name after people and institutions.

It is true that the newly discovered bacteria are named after their lover’s name, which belongs to the romance of microbiologists.

Louis Pasteur is one of the founders of microbiology. In order to express his respect and commemoration, in 1887, people really named a brand-new genus (equivalent to a big family) Pasteurella.

Up to now, Pasteurella "Junding Xingwang" has included 31 species and 4 subspecies, many of which are zoonotic pathogens, which coincides with some of Pasteur’s contributions (research on rabies and anthrax). I don’t know if Father Pasteur is happy or speechless.

Pasteur: I should still be happy, right? wikimedia commons/Paul Nadar

Examples of naming microorganisms after institutions or groups are no problem.

In 2010, a bacterium named Yimella was discovered [5]. YIM is the acronym of Yunnan Institute of Microbiology, and it is also the place where this bacterium was first discovered and studied. Yimella literally translated it as "Yunnan Institute of Microbiology". It’s a bit of a collective merit.

They also belong to this category.

Shigella flexneri: one of the pathogens of bacillary dysentery. The first half of the name commemorates Japanese bacteriologist K. Shiga, and the second half commemorates American bacteriologist Simon Flexner.

Rickettsia: the pathogen of typhus and trench fever. Howard Taylor Ricketts, a young American scientist, was unfortunately infected by him and gave his precious life during his research. In order to commemorate his contribution and sacrifice, later generations named it after him.

Legionella: During the Veterans’ Congress held in Philadelphia, USA in 1976, some veterans suffered from pneumonia, which was later confirmed to be caused by a new bacterium named Legionella.

Rule 5 of naming: flip through fairy tales

There’s a genus called Agaricus bisporus, which is very domineering, right? Friends who are familiar with western mythology may know that there is a god in Roman mythology with two faces: the front face looks ahead and the future can be seen; Looking back, you can see the past.

Two-faced gods in Roman mythology: wikimedia commons/ Loudon dodd.

Are the members of the genus Agaricus also very distinctive? No, it looks like an ordinary capsule (Bacillus) or ball (cocci).

However, most members of this genus have one thing in common: they can switch the two forms of Bacillus and cocci in different culture environments. This may also be one of the reasons why it was named like this.

They also belong to this category.

Mycobacterium chimaera: "Chimera" originated from a monster in Greek mythology. It has the head of a lion, the body of a goat and the tail of a python. Mycobacterium Chimera has obvious mixed genetic characteristics, hence its name.

Asgardarchaeota: Some scholars think that this kind of bacteria may be the common ancestor of all life on the earth. What’s more, they named the members of this kind of bacteria Odinarchaeota, Thorarchaeota, and Loki archaea in one breath … and they got together the family photos of the Nordic gods. By the way, these archaea have not yet been alive, and I sincerely hope that there will be a big coffee among the readers of the shell to clarify this process and name it "Ragnarok".

Guokr

In fact, there are many other naming methods, so I won’t list them here. In any case, the naming of microorganisms is a serious process. In the short name, there are both lessons of blood and tears, as well as the exploration of nature, which is an immortal testimony of our human wisdom and courage.

references

[1]Rosenbach FJ. Microorganismen bei den Wund-Infections-Krankheiten des Menschen. J.F. Bergmann, Wiesbaden, 1884.

[2]Shaw LN, Aish J, Davenport JE, et al. Investigations into sigmaB-modulated regulatory pathways governing extracellular virulence determinant production in Staphylococcus aureus. J Bacteriol. 2006; 188(17):6070-6080.

[3]Schleifer KH, Kloos WE. Isolation and characterization of staphylococci from human skin. I. Amended descriptions of Staphylococcus epidermidis and Staphylococcus sa prophyticus and descriptions of three new species: Staphylococcus cohnii, Staphylococcus haemolyticus, and Staphylococcus xylosus. International Journal of Systematic Bacteriology 1975; 25:50-61.

[4]Trevisan V. Sul Micrococco della rabbia e sulla possiblità di riconoscere durante il periodo d’incubazione, dall’esame del sangue della persona moricata, se ha contratta l’infezione rabbica. Rendiconti dell’Istituto Lombardo di Scienze e Lettere (Ser 2) 1887; 20:88-105.

[5]Tang SK, Wu JY, Wang Y, et al. Yimella lutea gen. nov., sp. nov., a novel actinobacterium of the family Dermacoccaceae. Int J Syst Evol Microbiol. 2010; 60(Pt 3):659-663.

[6]Castellani A, Chalmers AJ. Manual of Tropical Medicine, 3rd ed. Williams Wood and Co., New York, 1919.

[7]Yuen K Y , Woo P C Y , Teng J L L , et al. Laribacter hongkongensis gen. nov. sp. nov. A Novel Gram-Negative Bacterium Isolated from a Cirrhotic Patient with Bacteremia and Empyema[J] . Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 2001, 39(12):4227-4232.

[8]Woo P, Lau S, Teng J, et al. Association of Laribacter hongkongensis in community-acquired gastroenteritis with travel and eating fish: A multicentre case-control study[J]. Lancet, 2004, 363(9425):1941-1947.

Author: Tommy

Original title: "I found a new bacterium, can I name it Cyndi Wang? 》

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