Hey everybody, Dr. O here. In this video I want to introduce you to one of the historical figures that I expect you to know in microbiology, but then we're mainly going to talk about how to name microbes. So here we see Carolus Linnaeus, it's kind of interesting, his name was actually Carl Linnaeus, but he became so famous for this scientific nomenclature, scientific naming system where we latinize everything, that he basically latinized his own name into Carolus Linnaeus, but that's the name we'll use, I just find that kind of interesting. Somewhere in the 1730s, around 1735, he actually came up with the scientific naming system that we use to name microbes.
But one thing I find kind of interesting as well is he never actually named a microbe. So I have a quote from him. He said, they're too small. They're too confused.
No one will ever know anything exact about them. So he put them in what he called the class chaos. So I find that kind of interesting that he's credited with naming microbes, but didn't actually name them. So here we see the act.
the full naming system that you'd learn in a lot of your biology classes. Like we'll talk, if you look at the bottom, we'll talk about the domains and things like that. And phylum means basic body plan, basic body structure.
But his naming system was called binomial nomenclature or genus species naming. So the two that we're looking at here today is the genus and the species. So you will see that there is also a subspecies, and that becomes really important in microbiology because those will be our strains.
Like if I say streptococcus pneumonia, Yeah. That's the genus and the species, but there are strains of that organism, so those would be the subspecies. But today we're talking about genus-species naming, or the genus, which is the first word, and the specific epithet would actually be the second term in genus-species naming. So this is just an example here with a dog. Alright, so the rules.
The naming rules that Carolus Linnaeus came up with. When you're writing or typing out the scientific name for a bacteria or a microbe, They should be either italicized or underlined. So I don't always do that, but that is the rule, and you're expected to know that. So you italicize or underline the name.
Let's just say Escherichia coli, for example, or E. coli. So that should be underlined or italicized.
The first word, the genus, should be capitalized. So Escherichia would have a capital E. Coli will be lowercase.
So Escherichia coli there. These words are primarily Latinized because they're used all around the world. Primarily the names have Latin origins, but there are some Greek and different ones as well, but generally speaking they are Latinized.
As far as the names, you know, some of them don't make any sense at all, but most of them are either descriptive or they honor like the discoverer. So let me give you an example. I've already mentioned E. coli or Escherichia coli.
So Escherichia comes from the man that discovered it. His name is Theodore Escherich and coli tells you its location, the large intestine or the colon. Another example would be Staphylococcus aureus.
You've all heard of staph or staph infections. So Staphylococcus, as we'll learn in a few chapters, Staphylococcus means clusters of spheres. That's very descriptive. And aureus comes from the gold color that the colonies form. So those would be some really good examples of microbes.
Let me give you some that aren't so good, like Streptococcus pneumonia. Most of your pathogenic strains of Streptococcus pneumonia, strepto means chain. Most of them are actually diplococci, meaning they're just pairs. So little tiny things, we're not going to worry about that.
Another just kind of quote-unquote fun example, hemophilus influenza actually doesn't cause the flu. It can cause meningitis and different things, but they actually didn't know what caused the flu when they found that bacterium. Okay, as far as other rules, so we already said you italicize or underline them.
You capitalize the genus and the species is in lowercase. Those are very important naming rules. And then once you've used the name one time, that's when you can start to abbreviate it. So like, for example, you've heard E.
coli a million times. But if you're writing about E. coli, you should call it Escherichia coli the first time. And then you can call it E.
coli. Same thing with Staphylococcus aureus then being S. aureus.
I'm not really sure if Staph is ever actually, it's kind of, it's like a nickname more than anything. It's not technically an official scientific name. So, okay, so that's Carolus Linnaeus, one of your historical figures. as well as the rules for naming microbes. Have a wonderful day.
Be blessed.