Description

Mycoplasma is designated inmollicutes class of bacteria, a major contaminant of cell culture.Mycoplasma contamination in cell ranges from 15 to 35% worldwide, but this value could be around 85 %, depending upon the laboratory practices, sourceof cell lines and the frequency at which mycoplasma contamination is being monitored in the cell culture facility.It remains unnoticed in most of the culture due to its small size, and not detectable with the compound microscope.But the presence of mycoplasma severely affects your experimental findings by altering the gene expression profile, activation or repression of cellular pathways and affecting other physiological processes.Mycoplasma can grow at high density without any change in the media turbidity or pH of the culture media. But, the presence of mycoplasmain cell culture severely impacts the experimental findings by altering the gene expression profiles and manipulating various signalling pathways.There are more than 190 species of mycoplasma are identified, but approximately 95% of mycoplasma contamination in cell culture is caused by eight species(3)M. arginini, M. fermentans, M. hominis, M. hyorhinis, M. orale, M. pirum, M. salivarium, and A. laidlawii.

The elimination of mycoplasma is very difficult, if not impossible, The efficiency of antibiotics based elimination of mycoplasmas is between 66 and 85 percent , that too with mycoplasma specific antibiotics. The commonly used antibiotics such as penicillin and streptomycin are not effective against mycoplasma. Further,the long term use of these antibiotics is not recommended (4,5), as it may mask the presence of low levels of mycoplasma contamination and also negatively affect the cell physiology. Antibiotics also make the mycoplasma antibiotic-resistant if used for an extended period. So, the easiest way to avoid mycoplasma contamination in cell cultures is to examine them periodically.