be relied on as a guide for optimal treatment, but an at least six-week course of rifampicin or gentamicin and doxycycline twice daily is the combination most often used, and appears to be efficacious; the advantage of this regimen is that it is oral medication with no injections; however, a high rate of side effects (nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite) has also been reported. the relatedness in treatment and endemic overlap of tuberculosis remains an issue however, as treatment of one might cause resistance in the second. local dispensaries dealing first-hand with brucellosis are occasionally also not aware on how to treat properly, highlighting the need for reevaluation on implementation of international treatment regimes. as of august 2013, allison rice-ficht, ph.d. at texas a&m university and her team claim to be close to creating a human vaccine. it would primarily be used to immunize members of the military in case of exposure to weaponized brucella on the battlefield. host specificity and animal brucellosis brucella species have been found primarily in mammals: specieshost b. melitensisgoats and sheep b. abortuscattle b. canisdogs b. suispigs b. ovissheep b. neotomaedesert woodrat (neotoma lepida) b. pinnipedialisseal b. cetidolphin, porpoise, whale b. microticommon vole (microtus arvalis) b. inopinataunknown b. papionisbaboon b. vulpis red fox (vulpes vulpes) pathogenic brucella species can cause abortion in female animals by colonization of placental trophoblasts, and sterility in male animals. drugs with effects against brucella include tetracyclines, aminoglycosides (streptomycin, , gentamicin, netilmicin), rifampicin, quinolones (ciprofloxacin), and third-generation cephalosporins. treatment for uncomplicated brucellosis includes: streptomycin + doxycycline for 6 weeks tmp/smx + doxycycline for 6 weeks rifampicin + doxycycline for 6 weeks treatment of complicated brucellosis (endocarditis, meningitis) has no uniform agreement, but usually uses three anti-brucella drugs for three months. the plague of thebes brucellosis caused by b. abortus best fits the characteristics of the plague described in oedipus rex. although the disease progression of brucellosis in modern times may make it seem unlikely, it was at least one agent in what may have been a multicomponent plague, along with salmonella enterica serovar typhi or another pathogen, or possibly the ancestral versions of brucella were more lethal. genomics the brucella genome includes two chromosomes; the first chromosome codes mostly for genes related to metabolism, while the second (smaller one) includes several genes related to pathogenicity. the genomes of most brucella species have been sequenced, and typically encode 3,200 to 3,500 open reading frames (orfs). examples include: brucella abortus a13334, 3,401 orfs brucella canis atcc 23365, 3,408 orfs brucella melitensis 16m, 3,279 orfs brucella microti ccm 4915, 3,346 orfs brucella ovis atcc 25840, 3,193 orfs brucella pinnipedialis b2/94, 3,505 orfs brucella suis 1330, 3,408 orfs genome data for these and other brucella strains are available in the gold and patric databases. also, a public and editable spreadsheet of b. abortus 2308w genome annotation has been created, to be updated based on new discoveries. also, the genome annotation is available in a user friendly table at the web page http://hdl.handle.net/11056/23125. bacterial small rnas (srna) are an important class of regulatory molecules. many brucella srnas have been identified. phylogeny the currently accepted taxonomy is based on the list of prokaryotic names with standing in nomenclature (lpsn). the phylogeny is based on whole-genome analysis. brucella brucella thiophenivorans brucella pituitosa brucella grignonensis brucella rhizosphaerae brucella pseudogrignonensis brucella intermedia brucella lupini brucella anthropi brucella vulpis brucella inopinata brucella ovis brucella neotomae brucella abortus brucella melitensis brucella microti brucella ceti brucella suis brucella canis outgroup paenochrobactrum effect of blue light infection of macrophages by b. abortus is stimulated by blue light in the wild type, but is limited in photochemically inactive and null mutants, indicating a flavin-containing histidine kinase functions as a photoreceptor regulating b. abortus virulence. conversely, depriving brucella of the blue wavelengths dropped its reproductive rate by 90%. notes brucella abortus, brucella canis, brucella neotomae, brucella ovis, and brucella suis are all synonyms of brucella melitensis.