Ureaplasma urealyticum

Ureaplasma urealyticum is a small bacterium of the genus Ureaplasma, in the class Mollicutes, and it is one of the two Ureaplasma species most often found in people. Like other members of its class it has no cell wall, so it cannot be sorted into Gram-positive or Gram-negative groups by Gram staining, and antibiotics that attack cell wall construction do not work against it. It gets most of its energy from breaking down urea with the enzyme urease, and about 95 percent of its ATP production in the studied ureaplasmas is tied to that reaction. Strains once filed under this name were split in the early 2000s, and serovars 1, 3, 6 and 14 now belong to Ureaplasma parvum. It is commonly found as a harmless resident of the human urogenital tract, and finding it does not by itself mean disease. It has been linked to urethritis and to pregnancy complications, although its clinical importance remains uncertain.