The Lactic Acid Bacteria Volume 1: The Lactic Acid Bacteria in Health and Disease

494 Pages·1992·11.01 MB·English

by  P. G. Sarra

The Lactic Acid Bacteria: Volume 1
The Lactic Acid Bacteria in Health and Disease
The Lactic Acid Bacteria
Volume 1
The Lactic Acid Bacteria
in Health and Disease
Edited by
Brian J.B. Wood
Department of Bioscience and Biotechnology,
University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK
ELSEVIER APPLIED SCIENCE
LONDON and NEW YORK
ELSEVIER SCIENCE PUBLISHERS LTD
Crown House, Linton Road, Barking, Essex I G II 8JU, England
WITH 84 TABLES AND 45 ILLUSTRATIONS
© 1992 ELSEVIER SCIENCE PUBLISHERS LTD
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
The lactic acid bacteria.
Vol I: The lactic acid bacteria in health and disease.
I. Wood, Brian 1.B.
612.015
ISBN 1-85166-720-2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The lactic acid bacteria / edited by Brian 1.8. Wood.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents: v. 1. The Lactic acid bacteria in health & disease.
ISBN 1-85166-720-2 (v. I)
1. Lactic acid bacteria. I. Wood, Brian 1.B.
[DNLM: 1. Lactobacillus. QW 142.5.A8 1151]
QR121.L33 1992
589.9'5-dc20
DNLM/DLC 91-34281
for Library of Congress CIP
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Dedication
To the memory of Dr Cyril Rainbow, who first introduced me to the
lactic acid bacteria as interesting subjects for study, and who continued
to supply support and help when I needed it, long after I ceased to be
one of his students. And to that of his wife, Dorothy, known to us all as
Dot, who so patiently put up with many an evening when 'Red Triangle'
(later 'Worthington White Shield') consumption lasted far into the night.
Series Preface
Historical Background
lowe my interest in the lactic acid bacteria (LAB) to the late Dr Cyril
Rainbow, who introduced me to their fascinating world when he offered
me a place with him to work for a PhD on the carbohydrate meta
bolism of some lactic rods isolated from English beer breweries by
himself and others, notably Dr Dora Kulka. He was particularly
interested in their preference for maltose over glucose as a source of
carbohydrate for growth, expressed in most cases as a more rapid growth
on the disaccharide, but one isolate would grow only on maltose.
Eventually, we showed that maltose was being utilised by 'direct fermen
tation' as the older texts called it, specifically by the phosphorolysis
which had first been demonstrated for maltose by Doudoroff and his
associates in their work on maltose metabolism by a strain of Neisseria
meningitidis.
I began work on food fermentations when I came to Strathclyde
University, and I soon found myself involved again with the bacteria
which I had not touched since completing my doctoral thesis. In 1973
lG. Carr, C.V. Cutting and G.c. Whiting organised the 4th Long
Ashton Symposium Lactic Acid Bacteria in Beverages and Food and
from my participation in that excellent conference arose a friendship
with Geoff Carr. The growing importance of these bacteria was
subsequently confirmed by the holding, a decade later, of the first of
the Wageningen Conferences on the LAB. Discussions about the LAB,
and the fact that they were unusual and important enough to have
entire conferences devoted to them, with the Publishers (who had
proposed the idea which resulted in the production of Microbiology of
Fermented Foods) gave rise to the idea that there might be scope for a
book on them. Subsequent discussions with Geoff Carr refined 'a book'
vii
viii Series Preface
into 'a multi-volume series' and rather slowly Geoff and I began to lay
rough plans for such a series, a process greatly helped by our preference
for planning sessions in pubs. Sadly, Geoff died before the plans reached
fruition, but his thinking contributed much to my development of the
ideas which we hatched together, and I think that he would have
approved of the final form which this first volume has taken, and which
will set the style for subsequent volumes.
The Lactic Acid Bacteria
Most of us know what we mean when we use the expression 'lactic
acid bacteria'. We tend to think of them as a reasonably coherent
group, and this is convenient for a great many purposes. In fact, how
ever, the LAB remind me of a cloud in the sky, which can look
rather solid and well-bounded when viewed from a distance but
becomes more and more fuzzy and intangible the closer that one
approaches to it. The LAB are all Gram-positive; anaerobic, micro
aerophyllic or aero-tolerant; catalase negative; rods or cocci; most
importantly they all produce lactic acid as sole, major or an important
product from the energy-yielding fermentation of sugars. It used to be
thought that all LAB were non-motile and non-sporing, although we
now have the Sporolactobacilli, and motile organisms are reported
which would otherwise fit with the LAB. Listeria species produce lactic
acid as a major metabolic product, but I doubt if many people working
with the LAB as normally understood, would wish to admit Listeria to
membership of the club. The LAB as a group have a 'squeaky clean'
image, with such adverse effects as have been reported being, in general,
ascribed to unusual circumstances such as abnormal immune status. Yet
Listeria is closey related (according to modern classifications) to un
doubted LAB.
In practice, I think that most people who work with them would
include most of the following genera as genuine members of the lactic
acid group of bacteria:
Lactobacillus
Streptococcus
Pediococcus
Lactococcus
Leuconostoc
Series Preface IX
Bifidobacterium
Carnobacterium
Enterococcus
Sp orolactobacillus
although some might challenge certain inclusions, particularly Bifido
bacterium, whose placement in the Actinomycetaceae makes it rather
remote from the bulk of the genera listed above. On the other hand,
the effects of some Bifidobacteria, particularly those associated with the
intestinal tracts of infants still feeding on their mother's milk, display
many similarities with those of the principal LAB. In practice,
most workers recognise the affinities between Bifidobacteria and
other LAB. However, this opens up other questions, for example, the
attitude to be adopted to Actinomyces israelii which performs a homo
lactic fermentation when grown anaerobically in the absence of carbon
dioxide.
As noted below, our current plans are for the second volume of
this series to be a descriptive review of the genera of LAB and of
their principal species. I have been engaged in an exchange of letters
on the question of the limits to the LAB with Professor W.H. Holzapfel,
who has very kindly agreed to be co-editor of the planned volume. His
participation in the IUMS-subcommittees on Bifidobacterium and
Lactobacillus will provide good opportunities to develop discussion of
these issues, and I look forward to enhancing my understanding of
them.
Future Plans
The Lactic Acid Bacteria in Health and Disease is the first volume
of what is planned as a multi-volume series. It is intended that volume
2 will deal with the principal genera of the LAB, with a chapter
devoted to each of them. These chapters should include discussion of
the phylogenetic position of the genus in question and its relationship
to other genera of LAB, a description of the principal features which
are characteristic of the genus, and descriptions of the species in
the genus.
Further plans will inevitably be modified in the light of experience
gained with the first two volumes, feedback from readers and the
comments and suggestions of reviewers. At present, the following vol
umes are envisaged (not necessarily in the order listed):
x Series Preface
Genetics of the LAB
Physiology and Biochemistry
Uses (this volume will cover their role in food fermentations, lactic acid
production, vitamin assays, etc.)
We hope and believe that together these volumes will form a lasting
primary source and, as the computer experts would say, 'bench-mark'
against which future progress in our understanding of this diverse group
of bacteria can be measured.
Brian J.B. Wood
Preface
The idea that lactic acid bacteria (LAB) contribute to the health and
well-being of the individual who consumes them is one which goes back
to almost the beginning of bacteriology as we understand it today. It may
well be that certain foods-such as yoghurt-had a beneficial image prior
to the recognition that the process of conversion of the raw material into
the desired product involved the participation of the living entities which
we now know as various types of LAB. It certainly seems unlikely that
the importance attached to yoghurt by Metchnikoff came into being
by a kind of intellectual spontaneous generation, without any pre
existing body of ideas upon which to build. My experience of Poland,
and the clear evidence that the Polish thinking on these matters is
part of the shared inheritance common to much of Eastern Europe
and Russia, strongly suggest that yoghurt, kefir and similar products
have a long history of being credited with a variety of benefits which
can only be described as 'health-giving', 'health-promoting', 'healthful' or
some similar vague term for properties which, however vague and
difficult to pin down with precise definitions, have clear and important
significance for those familiar with the correct use of the products in
question. Traditions, particularly those associated with the treatment of
disease and the promotion of health and that very impalpable thing
which we call 'well-being', are inevitably regarded with a cautious
scepticism by the scientist, but we would be very ill-advised to reject
without any examination the body of accumulated observation which
such traditional beliefs encompass. The specific case of lactic-fermented
milk products is further complicated (or confused) by what we now
regard as the rather excessive claims made for them by the early workers
in this field, some of whom seem to have been driven more by a desire to
spread a message of universal longevity to be attained by regular
consumption of these products, than by a wish to subject these claims to
Xl
xii Preface
an objective scientific scrutiny. Despite these difficulties there now exists
a clear body of evidence which supports the view that lactic acid
fermentation can confer therapeutically useful properties on appropriate
foods, particularly those based on milks. The reviews in the present text
examine these matters from a variety of angles. The contribution made
by LAB to the microbial flora of diverse animals provides a sound
foundation for subsequent developments. This section of the book would
have been stronger still if a chapter dealing specifically with the lactic
flora of the urinogenital tract had been included; I thought that this area
was being covered, but the promised chapter failed to materialise and it
was too late by then to arrange alternative coverage of the topic.
However, aspects of it are touched upon by other authors in their
contributions.
In my opinion, the sheer variety of effects that the LAB can produce
has further complicated the interpretation of their contributions to
nutrition and health. Acidification of foods or of the intestinal tract will
produce an environment which is inhospitable to many pathogens,
spoilage organisms, etc. At the same time the utilisation of sugars by the
LAB further limits the potential for other organisms to grow. There is
growing evidence that lactic acid has inhibitory effects other than those
which can be ascribed simply to an increase in the hydrogen ion
concentration, and the ability of acetic acid, another major metabolite of
some LAB (the heterofermentative types), to enter living cells in the
non-ionised form from an acidic environment, then ionise in the cell with
devastating effects, is well documented. Production of anti-microbial
substances by LAB remains an area of interesting controversy, despite the
industrial importance of nisin and the clear evidence for a variety of
bacteriocin-like substances from LAB. The possible effects of hydrogen
peroxide and superoxide ion from LAB are mentioned by a number of
authors in diverse connections. The idea that LAB do not require iron,
and the ecological advantages which this confers upon them are dealt
with by a group from Ghent in Belgium (Chapter 18), many of whose
ideas I found both novel and stimulating. Several other ways in which
LAB may control the growth of other organisms are dealt with by
various authors, as are ways in which these activities may be of benefit
not only to animals, but even to plants.
To me, possibly because of my limited knowledge of clinical matters,
some of the greatest surprises were contained in the chapters on the roles
of LAB in the care of people suffering with tumours and in immuno
compromised subjects (Chapters 10 and 11, respectively). The evidence