Studies on bacterial surface translocation. 2. Correlation of twitching motility and fimbriation in colony variants of Moraxella nonliquefaciens, M. bovis, and M. kingii.

Abstract

Three strains of Moraxella nonliquefaciens, three strains of M. bovis and three strains of M. kingii that all have been separated into fimbriated variants, forming spreading and corroding colonies, and non-fimbriated variants, forming non-spreading and non-corroding colonies, were examined. It was found that spreading in all cases takes place by means of the type of surface translocation called twitching. Some possible implications of this are briefly discussed.