Welcome to the Leuconostoc Mesenteroides Homepage

Click on the links to the right to learn more about this Bacterium

Have you ever wondered how pickles could ever had possibly come from cucumbers? Have you ever wanted to know how yogurt was made? Do you have a strange obssesion with Lactic Acid Bacteria? If you answered yes to one or more of these questions then this website is just the thing for you!

Leuconostoc mesenteroides are Facultative Anaerobes of the Genus: Leuconostoc and Species: mesenteroides. They are gram positive. The cells that grow in liquid are cocci shaped and appear either singularly, in pairs, or in short chains. The cells that are present in glucose or other types of solid material are rod shaped. They have a cell wall. They are non-motile (can not move on its own) so it has no flagella or cilia. Leuconostoc mesenteroides are asporongeous bacteria, which means that they do not produce a spore for reproduction, instead they reproduce by splitting themselves in half. L.mesenteroides is one of a group of many diferent bacteria called Lactic Acid Bacteria (LAB). These bacteria are used in the production of fermented food products like making pickles from cucumbers, and by making sauerkraut.

Fred Breidt, North Carolina State University picture from article Leuconostic Mesenteroides atcc 8293

at web page http://genome.jgi-psf.org/draft_microbes/leume/leume.home.html