The disease was so devastating that it changed the social order, as a scarcity of labour led to higher wages for the survivors, hastening the demise of feudalism.The plague was caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterium that lives in fleas.
Daniel J. Salkeld of Stanford University and colleagues used data from black-tailed prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) colonies in Colorado to develop computational models that simulated periods of epidemics (epizootic phase) and quiescence (enzootic phase) in the plague bacterium (Yersinia pestis) transmitted by the prairie dog flea (Oropsylla hirsuta).
Unequivocal evidence for its early existence comes from analyses of ancient DNA in the teeth of Bronze Age humans, which indicate that Y. pestis was present in Asia and Europe by between 3000 and 800 bce.
Yersin named the new bacillus Pasteurella pestis, after his mentor, but in 1970 the bacterium was renamed Yersinia pestis, in honour of Yersin himself.
Bubonic plague, one of three clinical forms of plague, an infectious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis.
In this case, an epidemic would result as much from an alteration in the environment as from the presence of the causative agent Pasteurella pestis, since, in relatively balanced ecological systems, the causative agent exists enzootically in the rodents (i.e., they serve as reservoirs for the disease) and seldom involves man.
Alexandre Yersin, in full Alexandre-Émile-John Yersin, also called Alexandre-John-Émile Yersin (born Sept. 23, 1863, Lavaux, near Aubonne, Switz. died March 1 , 1943 Nha Trang, Annam, Indochina [now in Vietnam]) Swiss-born French bacteriologist and one of the discoverers of the bubonic plague bacillus, Pasteurella pestis, now called Yersinia pestis.
The outbreak was caused by Yersinia pestis, the bacterium associated with other plague outbreaks before and since the Great Plague of London.
Within a month he identified the causative organism of the plague, the bacillus Pasteurella pestis (now called Yersinia pestis; renamed after French bacteriologist Alexandre Yersin, who independently discovered the plague bacillus during the Hong Kong epidemic).
The agents of tularemia and bubonic plague, previously designated P. tularensis and P. pestis, respectively, have been reclassified as Francisella tularensis and Yersinia pestis.
The deadly bacteria Yersinia pestis primarily affects wild rodents, spread by fleas.
