Aspergillus species

A. niger v. Tiegham - click here for clinical material. More images

Colony characteristics. Colonies (CzA) black, consisting of a dense felt of conidiophores.

A

Microscopy. Conidiophore stipes smoth walled, hyaline or pigmented. Vesicles subspherical, 50-100 micrometre diam. Conidial heads radiate. Conidiogenous cells biseriate. Metulae twice as long as the phialides. Conidia brown, ornamented with warts and ridges, subspherical, 3.5-5.0 micrometre diam.
A - 1000x Stained with lacto-phenol cotton blue. (Courtesy of Niall Hamilton).

Pathogenicity. This species is frequently isolated subclinically (Beer & Taine, 1990) or clinically (Landry & Parkins, 1993) from human external ears. A cutaneous infections in bone marrow transplant recipient was reported by Johnson et al., (1993). A pulmonary aspergillome was described by Korzeniowska-Kosela et al., (1990). It was repeatedly implicated in human mycoses in different localisations, occasionally in disseminating infections (Rippon, 1998). Peritonitis was reported by Bibashi et al. (1993).

Variety. The variety A. niger var. awamori (Nakazawa) Al-Musallam has been reported as responsible for a case of subcutaneous infection (Paldrok, 1965).

References -

Selected historical references are listed below

Beer, P.L.R. & Taine, J., (1990). Otomycoses dans le territoire federal Amazonien (Venezuela). Bull. Soc. Fr. Mycol. Med. 19: 257-264.

Bibashi, E., Papagianni, A., Kelesidis, A., Antoniadou, R. & Papadimitriou, M. (1993). Peritonitis due to Aspergillus niger in a patient on continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis shortly after kidney graft rejection. Nephrol. Dial. Transpl. 8: 185-187.

Johnson, A.S., Ranson, M., Scarffe, J.H., Morgenstern, G.R., Shaw, A.J. & Oppenheim, B.A., (1993). Cutaneous infection with Rhizopus oryzae and Aspergillus niger following bone marrow transplantation. J. Hosp. Infect. 25: 293-296.

Korzeniowska-Kosela, M., Halweg, H., Bestry, I, Podsiadlo, B. & Krakowska, P., (1990). Pulmonary aspergilloma caused by Aspergillus niger. Pneumon. Pol. 58: 328-333.

Landry, M. & Parkins, C.W., (1993). Calcium oxalate crystal deposition in necrotising otomycosis caused by Aspergillus niger. Mod. Pathol. 6: 493-496.

Paldrok, H., (1965). Report on a case of subcutaneous dissemination of Aspergillus niger, type awamori. Acta Derm.-Venereol. 45: 275-282.

Raper, K.B. & Fennell, D.I. (1965).The genus  Aspergillus. Williams & Wilkins, Baltimore, 686 pp.

Rippon, J.W (1988).Medical Mycology. The pathogenic fungi and the pathogenic actinomycetes, 3rd ed. Saunders, Philadelphia, 797 pp.