Figure

Figure. Francisco Goya (1746–1828), Saturn Devouring His Son, 1819–1823, oil mural transferred to canvas, via Wikimedia Commons.

The first documented isolation of what would become known as Cronobacter sakazakii was from a can of dried milk in 1950, although these organisms have likely existed for millions of years. In 1980, John J. Farmer III, proposed the name Enterobacter sakazakii for what had been known as “yellow-pigmented E. cloacae,” in honor of Japanese bacteriologist Riichi Sakazaki. Over the next decades, E. sakazakii was implicated in scores of cases of meningitis and sepsis among infants, frequently in association with powdered infant formula. In 2007, the genus Cronobacter was created to accommodate the biogroups of E. sakazakii, with C. sakazakii as the type species. The genus was named for Cronos, the Titan of Greek myth, who devoured his children as they were born (Figure).