1953 E. S. Cook in Brewing Chemists' News Let. Sept. 4/3 Substances found in a number of tissues do not inhibit the growth of Staphylococcus aureus but actually stimulate it, hence the term ‘probiotic’.

1965 Science 12 Feb. 747/3 The probiotic effect was lost when the conditioned medium was subjected to prolonged autoclaving.

1978 Amer. Midland Naturalist 99 442 It is also possible..that antibiotic and/or probiotic chemical interactions influence interspecific competition.

1989 Science 25 Aug. 851/2 It is possible that the growth stimulation elicited by PQQ [= pyrroloquinoline quinone] is the result of its potential probiotic effects.

1988 Veterinary Rec. 10 Dec. 632 Probiotic use.

1989 W. L. Porter in B. A. Stark & J. M. Wilkinson Probiotics iv. 39 Trials with pigs, using probiotic culture material, have given excellent results in terms of weight gain.

1989 Woman's Jrnl. July 148/3 Protexin B, a probiotic powder, has been used in research on thousands of candida sufferers with a 75 per cent success rate.

2000 Daily Tel. 16 Feb. 21/2 Probiotic supplements containing bowel-friendly species of bacteria—especially enteric-coated Lactobacilli and Bifidobacteria species..—can help to overcome disease-causing gut infections.

1959 Ecology 40 526/2 Other areas..are described in brief paragraphs or are omitted entirely (e.g., the important studies..of the occurrence of algal antibiotics and probiotics..).

1965 Science 12 Feb. 747/2 It was also found possible to grow Colpidium in a chemically defined medium so that the unknown products, which we designate ‘probiotics’, could be readily separated from the known components of the culture medium.

1978 Infection & Immunity 22 889/1 He proposed the term ‘probiotics’ for those staphylococcal products that enhanced the growth of diphtheria bacilli.

1974 R. B. Parker in Animal Nutrition & Health Dec. 5/1 We refer to organisms and substances which contribute to intestinal microbial balances as ‘probiotics’.

1983 Progress in Food & Nutrition Sci. 7 5 The use of probiotics as a means of preventing enteric disease or for improving digestion was first suggested by Elie Metchnikoff.

1986 Times 14 June 5/7 The use of bacteria known as probiotics to reduce the effects of stress and promote growth in farm animals is attracting increasing interest in Britain.

1993 Western Horseman Mar. 116/2 I received the supplements from Jim, containing..a balanced vitamin supplement;..a probiotic that assists in digestion efficiency; and..a mineral supplement.

1999 Brit. Med. Jrnl. (Electronic ed.) 10 Apr. Of 180 patients in a double blind controlled study, 9.5% of those receiving the probiotic had diarrhoea compared with 22% of the controls given placebo.

1954 New Biol. 16 44 We have as yet no basis for confidence about the probiotic state.

1971 J. Z. Young Introd. Study Man xxvi. 372 A probiotic soup of amino-acids, ribose, four purine and pyrimidine bases, and a source of high-energy phosphate.

1988 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) A. 325 601 The term ‘prebiotic’ will be used to signify the time before the origin of life, as distinct from the term ‘probiotic’, which refers to events and processes involved directly in the development of biological from chemical systems.

1998 R. L. Gregory Oxf. Compan. Mind 233 Life probably began over 3,000 million years ago, perhaps in a probiotic soup of organic molecules.