Clostridium botulinum is a
Gram-positive, rod-shaped,
anaerobic, spore-forming, motile
bacterium with the ability to produce the neurotoxin
botulinum. The botulinum toxin can cause a severe
flaccid paralytic disease in humans and other animals and is the most potent toxin known to humankind, natural or synthetic, with a lethal dose of 1.3–2.1ng/kg in humans.