In honor of my microbiology class senior year, every Monday will now have a bacterium of the day! I figured a good one to start with is one I work with everyday: Neisseria meningitidis.
N. meningitidis (in the lab, we call it mening) is a relatively small bacteria, that is circular in shape, has a more complex membrane and survives in pairs (in science terms: mening is a gram negative diplococci). It is most famous for its role in causing meningitis.
The only place in the world mening lives is inside the nose/throat of humans. 1 in 5 people have mening living inside their nose, happy as can be. Most of the time mening will continue to live and spread from person to person through saliva and snot without causing any problems. But sometimes, for reasons unknown yet, mening can get pissy and cause problems. It decides to leave the throat and head into the bloodstream. Once in the bloodstream, mening can cross the blood-brain barrier and begin infecting the meninges (the meninges are the lining around the central nervous system – brain, spinal cord, etc.) and thus the name, meningitis. Meningitis can have someone 6 feet under in less than 24 hours. Septicemia (when mening infects your bloodstream) is just as bad and can also be fatal.
Symptoms of meningitis are very similar to the flu. The big difference is a very stiff neck (your meninges are swollen and hurt). People may also develop a rash. If you catch mening early, it can be treated with antibiotics. There are vaccines against some strains of meningitis, but not all strains (and that is why I still have a job). Mening still causes problems around the world, but the people most at risk are children under 5, military members, and high school and college students.
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