Pre_GI: SWBIT SVG BLASTP

Query: NC_007576:471500 Lactobacillus sakei subsp. sakei 23K, complete genome

Lineage: Lactobacillus sakei; Lactobacillus; Lactobacillaceae; Lactobacillales; Firmicutes; Bacteria

General Information: This strain (23K) was originally isolated from a French sausage. They are commonly found in the oral, vaginal, and intestinal regions of many animals. They are important industrial microbes that contribute to the production of cheese, yogurt, and other products such as fermented milks, all stemming from the production of lactic acid, which inhibits the growth of other organisms as well as lowering the pH of the food product. Industrial production requires the use of starter cultures, which are carefully cultivated, created, and maintained, which produce specific end products during fermentation that impart flavor to the final product, as well as contributing important metabolic reactions, such as the breakdown of milk proteins during cheese production. The end product of fermentation, lactic acid, is also being used as a starter molecule for complex organic molecule syntheses. Lactobacillus sakei is the predominant lactic acid bacteria found on fresh meat. This organism is used as a starter in the production of fermented meat products, and plays a major role in preserving meat products by inhibiting the growth of other bacteria.

Subject: NC_008525:270310 Pediococcus pentosaceus ATCC 25745, complete genome

Lineage: Pediococcus pentosaceus; Pediococcus; Lactobacillaceae; Lactobacillales; Firmicutes; Bacteria

General Information: Use in fermentation of food products. A distinctive characteristic of pediococci is their ability to form tetrads via cell division in two perpendicular directions in a single plane. Like other lactic acid bacteria, species of Pediococcus are acid tolerant, cannot synthesize porphyrins, and possess a strictly fermentative (homofermentative) facultatively anaerobic metabolism with lactic acid as the major metabolic end product. They also occur in such food products as cured meat, raw sausages, and marinated fish, and are are used for biotechnological processing and preservation of foods. This bacterium can be isolated from a variety of plant materials and bacterial-ripened cheeses. This organism is used as an acid producing starter culture in the fermentation of some sausages, cucumbers, green beans, soy milk, and silage. Some strains have been reported to contain several (3-5) resident plasmids that render the bacterium capable of fermenting some sugars (raffinose, melibiose, and sucrose), as well as producing bacteriocins.