title: Bacteria and vampirism in cinema.
abstract: A vampire is a non-dead and non-alive chimerical creature, which, according to various folklores and popular superstitions, feeds on blood of the living to draw vital force. Vampires do not reproduce by copulation, but by bite. Vampirism is thus similar to a contagious disease contracted by intravascular inoculation with a suspected microbial origin. In several vampire films, two real bacteria were staged, better integrated than others in popular imagination: Yersinia pestis and Treponema pallidum. Bacillus vampiris was created for science-fiction. These films are attempts to better define humans through one of their greatest fears: infectious disease.
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire de bactériologie et d'hygiène, UBM, CHU de Poitiers, BP 577, 86021 Poitiers cedex, France. Electronic address: o.castel@chu-poitiers.fr.
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Castel
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bourry
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Thévenot
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Burucoa
mesh_terms: D016470:Bacteremia / Q000266:history / Q000523:psychology* / Q000635:transmission; D001734:Bites, Human / Q000266:history / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000523:psychology; D005060:Europe; D005239:Fear; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D009040:Motion Pictures / Q000266:history; D009229:Mythology; D058873:Pandemics / Q000266:history; D010930:Plague / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000266:history / Q000523:psychology; D057175:Posters as Topic; D013587:Syphilis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000266:history / Q000635:transmission; D014210:Treponema pallidum; D015010:Yersinia pestis
keywords: Bacteria; Bactéries; Cinema; Cinéma; Film; Treponema pallidum; Vampirism; Vampirisme; Yersinia pestis