Finally, it is interesting to observe the shapes of the yellow/
green stain in cells with intermediate membrane depolarization. It
appears that JC-1 dye accumulates differently inside the cell,
leaving a part of intracellular area stained green (Fig. 5). This may
suggest a widespread presence of plasmolysis in cells with
partially depolarized membranes. Phase contrast microscopy observations
of L. monocytogenes LGB cells taken from the D treated
samples are shown in Fig. 6. White arrows indicate membrane
detachment from the cell wall, probably after an osmotic membrane
shrinkage, apparently confirming the above-mentioned
hypothesis. After compression, cell morphological and structural
changes, such as cell lengthening, gas vacuole compression and
separation of the membrane from the cell wall, are observable
(Patterson, 2005). Thus, such an event should not be surprising as
osmotic shock is not uncommon during microbial cell compression
(Hayashi, 2002).
Fig.