Editing Vibrio cholerae (section)

== Discovery ==
=== Initial observations ===
During the [[1846–1860 cholera pandemic|third global pandemic of cholera (1846–1860)]], there was extensive scientific research to understand the etiology of the disease.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Tognotti|first=Eugenia|date=2011|title=The dawn of medical microbiology: germ hunters and the discovery of the cause of cholera|journal=Journal of Medical Microbiology|volume=60|issue=Pt 4|pages=555–558|doi=10.1099/jmm.0.025700-0|pmid=21212146|doi-access=free}}</ref> The [[miasma theory]], which posited that infections spread through contaminated air, was no longer a satisfactory explanation. The English physician [[John Snow]] was the first to give convincing evidence in London in 1854 that cholera was spread from drinking water – a contagion, not miasma. Yet he could not identify the pathogens, which made most people still believe in the miasma origin.<ref name=":3">{{Cite journal|last1=Lippi|first1=D.|last2=Gotuzzo|first2=E.|date=2014|title=The greatest steps towards the discovery of Vibrio cholerae|journal=Clinical Microbiology and Infection|volume=20|issue=3|pages=191–195|doi=10.1111/1469-0691.12390|pmid=24191858|doi-access=free}}</ref>

''V. cholerae'' was first observed and recognized under microscope by the French zoologist [[Félix-Archimède Pouchet]]. In 1849, Pouchet examined the stool samples of four people having cholera.<ref name=":4">{{Cite book|last=Hugh|first=Rudolph|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NP7AY38J1hcC|title=Public Health Service Publication|date=1965|publisher=U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Public Health Service, Environmental Health Service, National Air Pollution Control Administration|pages=1–4|language=en|chapter=Nomenclature and taxonomy of Vibrio cholerae Pacini 1854 and Vibrio eltor Pribam 1933|access-date=2021-04-05|archive-date=2023-07-02|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230702065612/https://books.google.com/books?id=NP7AY38J1hcC|url-status=live}}</ref> His presentation before the [[French Academy of Sciences]] on 23 April was recorded as: "[Pouchet] could verify that there existed in these [cholera patients] dejecta an immense quantity of microscopic [[infusoria]]."  As summarised in the Gazette medicale de Paris (1849, p 327), in a letter read at the 23 April 1849 meeting of the [[Paris Academy of Sciences]], Pouchet announced that the organisms were ''[[infusoria]]'', a name then used for microscopic [[protists]], naming them as the '''Vibrio rugula'' of Mueller and Shrank', a species of [[protozoa]] described by Danish naturalist [[Otto Friedrich Müller]] in 1786.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Pollitzer|first=R.|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zHNrAAAAMAAJ&q=bacillus+cholerae+trevisan+1884&pg=PA380|title=Proceedings of the Cholera Research Symposium, January 24-29, 1965, Honolulu, Hawaii|date=1965|publisher=U.S. Public Health Service|pages=380–387|language=en|chapter=Cholera advances in historical perspective|access-date=2021-04-20|archive-date=2023-07-02|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230702065612/https://books.google.com/books?id=zHNrAAAAMAAJ&q=bacillus+cholerae+trevisan+1884&pg=PA380|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Identification of the bacterium ===
An Italian physician, [[Filippo Pacini]], while investigating cholera outbreak in Florence in the late 1854, identified the causative pathogen as a new type of bacterium. He performed autopsies of corpses and made meticulous microscopic examinations of the tissues and body fluids. From feces and [[intestinal mucosa]], he identified many comma-shaped bacilli.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Who first discovered cholera?|url=https://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/firstdiscoveredcholera.html|access-date=2021-04-04|website=www.ph.ucla.edu|archive-date=2021-04-17|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210417111245/http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow/firstdiscoveredcholera.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Nardi|first=M. G.|date=1954|title=[Discovery of Vibrio cholerae by Filippo Pacini, of Pistoia, established in the initial phases of microbiological thought and judged after a century]|url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14355829|journal=Minerva Medica|volume=45|issue=102|pages=1024–1029|pmid=14355829|access-date=2021-04-04|archive-date=2022-10-05|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221005133108/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14355829/|url-status=live}}</ref> Reporting his discovery before the Società Medico-Fisica Fiorentina (Medico-Physician Society of Florence) on 10 December, and published in the 12 December issue of the ''Gazzetta Medica Italiana'' (''Medical Gazette of Italy''), Pacini stated:{{blockquote|Le poche materie del vomito che ho potuto esaminare nel secondo e terzo caso di cholera ... e di più trovai degli ammassi granulosi appianati, simili a quelli che si formano alla superficie delle acque corrotte, quando sono per svilupparsi dei vibrioni; dei quali di fatto ne trovai alcuni del genere ''Bacterium'', mentre la massima parte, per la loro estrema piccolezza, erano stati eliminati con la decantazione del fluido. [From the few samples of vomit that I was able to examine in the second and third cases of cholera ... and in addition I found smoothed granular masses, similar to those which form on the surface of dirty waters, when they are about to develop vibrios; of which in fact I found some of the genus ''Bacterium'', while the greatest part, because of their extreme smallness, had been eliminated with the removal of the liquid.<ref>Fillipo Pacini (1854) [https://books.google.com/books?id=xdtQAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA397 "Osservazioni microscopiche e deduzioni patologiche sul cholera asiatico"] (Microscopic observations and pathological deductions on Asiatic cholera), ''Gazzetta Medica Italiana:  Toscana'', 2nd series, 4(50) :  397–401; 4(51): 405–412. Reprinted (more legibily) as a [https://books.google.com/books?id=F9s_AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA1 pamphlet.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231201205632/https://books.google.com/books?id=F9s_AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA1 |date=2023-12-01 }}</ref>]}}Pacini thus introduced the name ''vibrioni'' (Latin ''vībro'' means "to move rapidly to and fro, to shake, to agitate"). A [[Catalonia|Catalan]] physician Joaquim Balcells i Pascual also reported such bacterium around the same time.<ref>{{cite web|year=2018|editor=[[Real Academia de la Historia]]|title=Joaquín Balcells y Pasqual|url=http://dbe.rah.es/biografias/18541/joaquin-balcells-y-pasqual|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190708211444/http://dbe.rah.es/biografias/18541/joaquin-balcells-y-pasqual|archive-date=2019-07-08|access-date=2020-08-01|language=es}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|year=2015|editor=[[:ca:Col·legi Oficial de Metges de Barcelona|Col·legi Oficial de Metges de Barcelona]]|title=Joaquim Balcells i Pascual|url=http://www.galeriametges.cat/galeria-fitxa.php?icod=EGMM|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200801110910/http://www.galeriametges.cat/galeria-fitxa.php?icod=EGMM|archive-date=2020-08-01|access-date=2020-08-01|language=ca}}</ref> The discovery of the new bacterium was not regarded as medically important as the bacterium was not directly attributed to cholera. Pacini also stated that there was no reason to say that the bacterium caused the disease since he failed to create a pure culture and perform experiments, which was necessary 'to attribute the quality of contagion to cholera'.<ref name=":3" /> The miasma theory was still not ruled out.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Subba Rao|first1=M.|last2=Howard-Jones|first2=N.|date=1978|title=Original observations of Filippo Pacini on vibrio cholera|url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11613633|journal=Bulletin of the Indian Institute of History of Medicine|volume=8|issue=1–4|pages=32–38|pmid=11613633|access-date=2021-04-04|archive-date=2022-03-23|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220323195612/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11613633/|url-status=live}}</ref>

=== Rediscovery ===
The medical importance and relationship between the bacterium and the cholera disease was discovered by German physician [[Robert Koch]]. In August 1883, Koch, with a team of German physicians, went to Alexandria, Egypt, to investigate the cholera epidemic there.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Howard-Jones|first=N.|date=1984|title=Robert Koch and the cholera vibrio: a centenary|journal=British Medical Journal|volume=288|issue=6414|pages=379–381|doi=10.1136/bmj.288.6414.379|pmc=1444283|pmid=6419937}}</ref> Koch found that the intestinal mucosa of people who died of cholera always had the bacterium, yet he could not confirm if it was the causative agent. He moved to Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, where the epidemic was more severe. It was from here that he isolated the bacterium in a pure culture on 7 January 1884. He subsequently confirmed that the bacterium was a new species, and described it as "a little bent, like a comma."<ref name=":3" /> He reported his discovery to the German Secretary of State for the Interior on 2 February, and it was published in the ''Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift'' (''German Medical Weekly'').<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Robert|first=Koch|date=1884|title=Sechster Bericht der deutschen wissenschaftlichen Commission zur Erforschung der Cholera|url=https://www.scopus.com/record/display.uri?eid=2-s2.0-33748441571&txGid=8dfe522676542084e21a1178b5e3695a|journal=Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift|volume=10|pages=191–192}}</ref>

Although Koch was convinced that the bacterium was the cholera pathogen, he could not entirely procure critical evidence that the bacterium produced the symptoms in healthy subjects (an important element in what was later known as [[Koch's postulates]]). His experiment on animals using his pure bacteria culture did not lead to the appearance of the disease in any of the subjects, and he correctly deduced that animals are immune to the human pathogen. The bacterium was by then known as "the comma bacillus."<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Nair|first1=G. Balakrish|last2=Narain|first2=Jai P.|date=2010|title=From endotoxin to exotoxin: De's rich legacy to cholera|journal=Bulletin of the World Health Organization|volume=88|issue=3|pages=237–240|doi=10.2471/BLT.09.072504|pmc=2828792|pmid=20428396}}</ref> It was only in 1959, in Calcutta, that Indian physician [[Sambhu Nath De]] isolated the cholera toxin and showed that it caused cholera in healthy subjects, hence fully proving the bacterium-cholera relationship.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=De|first=S. N.|date=1959|title=Enterotoxicity of bacteria-free culture-filtrate of Vibrio cholerae|url=https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/13666809|journal=Nature|volume=183|issue=4674|pages=1533–1534|doi=10.1038/1831533a0|pmid=13666809|bibcode=1959Natur.183.1533D|s2cid=34139686|access-date=2021-04-04|archive-date=2021-05-26|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210526033610/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/13666809/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Nair|first1=G. Balakrish|last2=Takeda|first2=Yoshifumi|date=2011|title=Dr Sambhu Nath De: unsung hero|journal=The Indian Journal of Medical Research|volume=133|issue=2 |pages=127|pmc=3089041|pmid=21415484}}</ref>

=== Taxonomy ===
Pacini had used the name "''vibrio cholera''", without proper [[Binomial nomenclature|binomial]] rendering, for the name of the bacterium.<ref>{{Cite web|last=|title=Taxonomy browser (Vibrio cholerae)|url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Taxonomy/Browser/wwwtax.cgi?mode=info&id=666|access-date=2021-04-05|website=www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov|archive-date=2020-09-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200920060115/https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Taxonomy/Browser/wwwtax.cgi?mode=Info&id=666|url-status=live}}</ref> Following Koch's description, a scientific name ''Bacillus comma'' was popularised. But an Italian bacteriologist Vittore Trevisan published in 1884 that Koch's bacterium was the same as that of Pacini's and introduced the name ''Bacillus cholerae.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Subba Rao|first1=M.|last2=Howard-Jones|first2=N.|date=1978|title=Original observations of Filippo Pacini on vibrio cholera|url=http://ccras.nic.in/sites/default/files/viewpdf/jimh/BIIHM_1978/32%20to%2038.pdf|journal=Bulletin of the Indian Institute of History of Medicine (Hyderabad)|volume=8|issue=1–4|pages=32–38|pmid=11613633|access-date=2021-04-05|archive-date=2022-07-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220707032600/http://www.ccras.nic.in/sites/default/files/viewpdf/jimh/BIIHM_1978/32%20to%2038.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>'' A German physician [[Richard Friedrich Johannes Pfeiffer]] renamed it as ''Vibrio cholerae'' in 1896.<ref name=":4" /> The named was adopted by the [[Society of American Bacteriologists|Committee of the Society of American Bacteriologists on Characterization and Classification of Bacterial Types]] in 1920.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Winslow|first1=C. E.|last2=Broadhurst|first2=J.|last3=Buchanan|first3=R. E.|last4=Krumwiede|first4=C.|last5=Rogers|first5=L. A.|last6=Smith|first6=G. H.|date=1920|title=The Families and Genera of the Bacteria: Final Report of the Committee of the Society of American Bacteriologists on Characterization and Classification of Bacterial Types|journal=Journal of Bacteriology|volume=5|issue=3|pages=191–229|doi=10.1128/JB.5.3.191-229.1920|pmc=378870|pmid=16558872}}</ref> In 1964, Rudolph Hugh of the George Washington University School of Medicine proposed to use the genus ''Vibrio'' with the type species ''V. cholerae'' (Pacini 1854) as a permanent name of the bacterium, regardless of the same name for protozoa.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Hugh|first=R.|date=1964|title=The Proposed Conservation of the Generic Name Vibrio Pacini 1854 and Designation of the Neotype Strain of Vibrio Cholerae Pacini 1854|journal=International Bulletin of Bacteriological Nomenclature and Taxonomy|language=en|volume=14|issue=2|pages=87–101|doi=10.1099/0096266X-14-2-87|doi-access=free}}</ref> It was accepted by the [[International Code of Nomenclature of Prokaryotes|Judicial Commission of the International Committee on Bacteriological Nomenclature]] in 1965,<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Judicial Commission of the International Committee on Bacteriological Nomenclature|date=1965|title=Opinion 31. Conservation of Vibrio Pacini 1854 as a Bacterial Generic Name, Conservation of Vibrio Cholerae Pacini 1854 as the Nomenclatural Type Species of the Bacterial Genus Vibrio, and Designation of Neotype Strain of Vibrio Cholerae Pacini|journal=International Bulletin of Bacteriological Nomenclature and Taxonomy|language=en|volume=15|issue=3|pages=185–186|doi=10.1099/00207713-15-3-185|doi-access=free}}</ref> and the [[International Association of Microbiological Societies]] in 1966.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Feeley|first=J. C.|date=1966|title=Minutes of IAMS Subcommittee on Taxonomy of Vibrios|journal=International Journal of Systematic Bacteriology|language=en|volume=16|issue=2|pages=135–142|doi=10.1099/00207713-16-2-135|doi-access=free}}</ref>