unknown swarms in purulent sputum

[md0]

Hello everybody,

I hope I'm not off-topic with this, but I couldn't find a more appropiate message board for this subject. I kindly ask the moderator to move this message if that's the case.

I am a newbie at trying to identify microorganisms using a microscope. Recently I came down with what appears to be a throat infection. Naturally, I went to the microscope to try and find the pathogen responible. I've collected a very yellow sputum sample and made a went mount with it. As far as I could tell there were no bacteria on the slide (either dead or alive), but I did came across a lot of "swarms" of some very small (probably 0.3 - 0.4 um) elements that appear to be engaged in a rigurous brownian movement.

Can anyone tell me what could those be? They are too small for bacteria and don't quite behave like one...
Here's the link for two videos that showcase the phenomenom: http://masoft.ro/video/micro/

Thank you very much for you input on this!

[MichaelG.]

Hello everybody,

I hope I'm not off-topic with this, but I couldn't find a more appropiate message board for this subject.

Welcome md0

Sorry, I don't personally have the expertise to advise you, but with a title of MicrobeHunter this should be the ideal place to pose your question.

MichaelG.

[apochronaut]

Infections such as that, cause the body to flood the area with white blood cells. That's pretty much what phlegm and pus are. Although , your imaging isn't very clear, the areas where the "swarming" is taking place, look to be the cytoplasmic granules of certain white blood cells.

[md0]

Thank you, apochronaut! I guess it's a viral infection then. I'll look into cytoplasmic granules to try to better understand what I'm seeing.