Actinomyces is a genus of the Actinobacteria class of bacteria. They are all gram-positive. Actinomyces species are facultatively anaerobic (except A. meyeri and A. israelii both obligate anaerobe), and they grow best under anaerobic conditions.

Actinomyces species are ubiquitous, occurring in soil and in the microbiota of animals, including the human microbiota. They are known for the important role they play in soil ecology; they produce a number of enzymes that help degrade organic plant material, lignin, and chitin. Thus their presence is important in the formation of compost. Certain species are commensal in the skin flora, oral flora, gut flora, and vaginal flora of humans and livestock.

Actinomyces are pathogens for oral cavity, abscesses in mouth, lungs or GI.

They are known for causing diseases in humans and livestock, usually when they get an opportunity to gain access to the body's interior through wounds. As with other opportunistic infections, people with immunodeficiency are at higher risk. In all of the preceding traits and in their branching filament formation, they bear similarities to Nocardia.
Like various other anaerobes, Actinomyces species are fastidious and thus not easy to culture and isolate. Clinical laboratories do culture and isolate them, but a negative result does not rule out infection, because it may be due simply to reluctance to grow in vitro.

 

• PMID 20463251

• PMID 22390973

• PMID 8513051