Escherichia Coli

E. coli redirects here. See also Entamoeba coli. Escherichia coli (IPA: ) (E. coli), is one of many species of bacteria living in the lower intestines of mammals, known as gut flora. When located in the large intestine, it assists with waste processing, vitamin K production, and food absorption. Discovered in 1885 by Theodor Escherich, a German pediatrician and bacteriologist, E. coli are abundant: the number of individual E. coli bacteria in the feces that a human defecates in one day averages between 100 billion and 10 trillion. However, the bacteria are not confined to this environment, and specimens have also been located, for example, on the edge of hot springs. The E. coli strain O157:H7 is one of hundreds of strains of the bacterium that causes illness in humans.
See more at Wikipedia.org...

Full term for E. coli, the colon bacillus.

A gram-negative bacterium whose genome has been sequenced in its entirety. It is model organisms for the study of the prokaryotes. Link to the E.coli genome project website.

Noun
1. a species of bacterium normally present in intestinal tract of humans and other animals; sometimes pathogenic; can be a threat to food safety
(synonym) E. coli
(hypernym) escherichia

a Gram-negative bacterium commonly found in the human colon, the most thoroughly studied of all bacteria, frequently used in recombinant bacterial fermentation.