[A methodology for determining reservoirs of the causative agents of sapronoses]

Comparative ecological strategy for choosing the causative agents of melioidosis and glanders, pseudotuberculosis and plague after McArthur [correction of Macartura] and Wilson were studied. The kinetic analysis of the populations of these bacilli in the steppe neocultured chestnut soil formed a basis of the study with the consideration of data on their growth and death in artificial culture media. To identify the types of selection, the authors defined the rate of growth, the level of population stabilization, the dependence of the object growth rate on their population density, the survival capacity under competitive conditions. The kinetic analysis indicated that the causative agents of melioidosis and pseudotuberculosis have all necessary potentials for active soil existence and this substrate may be considered to be their reservoir; the plague bacillus has no such potentials and the telluric theory of plague does not withstand experimental tests. It is concluded that to define a selection strategy may be regarded as a new guideline for studying and identifying the reservoirs of causative agents of sapronoses and infections with the supposed sources of non-animal origin.