Unknown Unidentified
Unidentified cell body in gram stain! Help! Please see details.?
I have an unknown bacteria sample. It is a gram-positive rod. Mixed in the sample are small, oval, uniform cell bodies. During a gram stain they stain purple along the edges and remain clear in the center. The stain is slightly thicker at the ends of the oval. When the sample was spore stained, the cell bodies looked the same except green instead of purple. In both the gram stain and the spore stain, very few oval bodies stained fully with no clear center. The plates show a seemingly pure culture, and have been streaked several times in an attempt to separate. However, after each successful streaking, the mysterious cells continued to show mixed with the rod bacteria. My professors and I thought it could be spores staining in the gram stain; that is the best guess we have. Does anyone have any further insight or knowledge of what this could be? Thanks.
First, I assume you made certain you performed the staining properly. A Gram stain is still a stain, and will stain things that are not bacteria.
Spores can sometimes be hard to stain, or stain very lightly. An oil immersion microscope with good contrast might help you see their color. The fact that you see fully stained spores indicates these are most likely spores or spore related. You might also be seeing spores in the early stages of formation or germination.
There is also a possibility that you are seeing spore husks from erupted vegetative bacteria, but this is a fanciful guess.
Using a phase contrast microscope to view them might give you better insights as to what they are. You should certainly be able to see any internal structures… assuming they have internal structures (i.e. are living things).
Check out some pics, see if anything looks familiar:
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