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A Worm's World: Germs? No Problem

Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News

Photos

Good Medicine?

Nov. 19, 2007 -- Researchers looking for new chemical compounds to combat germs are finding them in a surprising source: worms.

For hundreds of thousands of years, worms have flourished in excrement and germ-filled conditions that people spend countless dollars and hours trying to wash off and avoid.

"Phylogenetically, earthworms are a very old group," Boris Byzov, who led one of the research teams, told Discovery News.

"They are presumably the most ancient soil dwellers and have been around in sediments of the Precambrian and Ordovician (over 500 million years ago)," added Byzov, a Faculty of Soil Science researcher in the Russian Federation's Department of Soil Biology.

Byzov and his colleagues dug up worms in cow manure-rich soils at Moscow Lomonosov State University. The researchers measured the amount of bacteria and fungi in both soil and "fresh excrement" from worms. Interestingly, the worm poo contained a different microorganism mixture, with significantly less fungi.

The scientists then took fluid from the worm's digestive tract and subjected it to a bacterial and fungi barrage. The tests indicate the earthworm gut environment acts as a filter, and even a fermenter, for at least some types of microorganisms.

"Earthworms selectively kill and then digest some bacteria and fungi," Byzov explained. "Other microorganisms can successfully pass the digestive tract with some populations multiplying in the posterior part of the gut."

He said this activity helps to keep soil microbial communities in balance. Worm poo even changes how soil absorbs water.