Microorganism in the Environment

Often scientists work with bacteria that do not come in a labeled test tube— for example, bacterial samples taken from infected human tissue or from the soil—and the scientist must then identify the unknown microorganism in order to understand what behavior to expect from the organism, for example, a certain type of infection or antibiotic resistance. However, because of the relatively few forms of bacteria compared to animals and because of the lack of bacterial fossil records due to their asexually reproductive nature, the taxonomy used to classify animals cannot be applied to bacteria (Brown 275). In order to classify unknown bacteria, a variety of physiological and metabolic tests are available to narrow a sample down from the fathomless number of possibilities into a more manageable range. Once these tests have been performed, the researcher can consult Bergey’s Manual of Determinative Bacteriology, a systematically arranged and continually updated collection of all known bacteria based on their structure, metabolism, and other attributes.

There are many reasons for knowing the identity of microorganisms. The reasons range from knowing the causative agent of a disease in a patient, so as to know how it can be treated, to knowing the correct microorganism to be used for making certain foods or antibiotics. This study was done by applying all of the methods that I have been learned so far in the microbiology laboratory class for the identification of an unknown bacterium.

For the temperature treatment, it was decisive in that the A. franciscana showed a steady increase in concentration from section 1 to 4. This expands on the hypothesis that suggests A. franciscana prefers an optimum temperature between 20-24 ̊ C because from the results of the experiment A. franciscana seemed to prefer even higher temperatures. Al Dhaheri and Drew (2003) state that A. franciscana stop reproducing at temperature above 30 ̊ C and compared to the experiments results. It can be concluded that A. franciscana prefer warmer temperatures, but reproduce at lower

In this lab, the organism that we have been working with is the bacterium, Serratia marcescens. S. marcescens is a member of the Enterobacteriaceae family, and tends to grow in damp environments. S. marcescens is an ideal bacterium to work with in the lab because it reproduces quicker than other bacterium. This bacterium produces a special pigment called prodigiosin, which is red in color. The prodigiosin pigment is intensified when S. marcescens is grown at higher densities. During our experiment, temperature, pH, salinity concentration and oxygen requirements were tested on S. marcescens to measure their optimal growth and prodigiosin production.

70µL of competent E.coli are added to both test tubes; pUC18 and Lux (Alberte et al., 2012). Both test tubes are then tapped and placed back into the ice bath for 15 minutes. While waiting, another test tube is obtained, filled with 35µL of competent cells and labeled NP for no plasmid. A water bath is preheated to 37 degrees Celsius and all three labeled test tubes are inserted into the bath for five minutes (Alberte et al., 2012). Using a sterile pipet 300µL of nutrient broth are inserted into both the control and Lux test tubes and 150µL are inserted to the no plasmid test tube to increase bacterial growth. All three test tubes are then incubated at 37 degrees for 45 minutes. Six agar plates are obtained and labeled to correspond each test tube, three of the plates contain ampicillin. A pipet is used to remove 130µl from each test tube containing a plasmid and insert it into the corresponding agar plate. For this, a cell spreader is first

this means that is the optimal temperature, but in bacterial occur in less time than in fungal

When reflecting back to experiment 3, Aseptic Technique and Culturing Microbes, I realized the large amount of microorganisms that can be found in everyday life. Many different types are found with in the human body. Theses experiments focused on two types of bacteria. First was Staphylococcus epidermidis, found on the skin, and second was Lactobacillus acidophilus, found in the gastrointestinal tract. Both have similar needs for growth when it comes to temperature, however, different growth environments are used.

Microorganisms need energy and that is generated through these metabolic activities (Jurtshuk, 1996). Through this experiment, it is shows that all the bacteria experienced different metabolic activities in different mediums.

Final experiment is to test if the microbe had a red pigment at 25ºC. At the beginning of this experiment, we had inoculated the microbe to have more than one pure culture. Therefore, I inoculated a clean petri dish, allowed it to grow and saw the results.

These organisms use several adaptations in order to survive high temperatures. They are prokaryotes, which more easily adapt to extreme temperatures than eukaryotes. They use salts such as potassium and magnesium to protect their DNA from degradation, and they generate special polyamines that help to protect the proteins in their DNA from being degraded in high temperatures. One adaptation that thermophilic archaea have that helps them to survive high temperatures is ether bonds in their cell membranes, which are more stable than bonds found in many other

As expected, during the temperature test, the least amount of bubbles were emitted in tubes that had been exposed to extreme heat. The tube placed in boiling water yielded zero millimeters of bubbles. The boiling water denatured the enzyme and altered its chemical structure rendering it incapable of undergoing metabolic reactions. For these same reasons, the vile placed in a hot bath, containing water at 85 degrees, produced only one

Being able to control bacterial growth is something that is important in our everyday lives. As shown in the previous labs, bacteria can grow and create colonies extremely quickly especially in the right environments. By acknowledging this, it is then important to get an understanding of how bacterial growth can be controlled by humans. To control microorganisms it means to inhibit their growth (static) and or kill them (cidal) (Kenneth Todar, 2015); therefore since focusing on bacteria the terms bactericidal and bacteriostatic are both extremely important for this lab. One broad method we will use to control bacterial growth is heat. The amount of heat needed to control bacterial growth is different for different species of bacteria (Kenneth Todar, 2015). Bacteria can also respond differently depending if moist heating method such as an autoclave with steam is used, or a dry heating method such as inoculating a loop over a fire is used (Kenneth Todar, 2015). UV works by damaging the cells DNA, without proper DNA, the cells will die and the object

The purpose of the two experiments was to determine the fundamental effects that temperature has on the growth and survival of bacteria. During the first experiment five different bacterial broth cultures of Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas fluorescens, Enterococcus faecalis, Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus stearothermophilus were individually incubated at temperatures of 5, 25, 37, 45 and 55°C for one week in an aim to distinguish the effect temperature has on growth and survival of the five different species. After one week they were observed for distinguishable changes by the turbidity showing an indication of bacterial growth, or the clarity an indication of no survival.

This experiment was performed to test the hypothesis if LB nutrient broth, +pGLO and -pGLO Ampicillin, and Arabinose was placed in the E. coli plates, then there will be a significant growth in the newly transformed bacteria and it will possess the ability to glow under UV light. The measurements were recorded from the bent glass tube in each glass test tube. The transformation protocol tested for the newly possessed traits in E.coli bacteria. Throughout the experiment there were many probable reasons for failure. If the pipettes and sterile loop were not thrown out in between each use, a cross contamination could cause a miscalculation in the experiment causing the data results to fail. The hypothesis that was tested was validated due to the positive results with each experiment stating that newly transformed organisms due in fact pass on traits.

Microbial growth can be affected by different environmental factors such as temperature, osmotic pressure, oxygen concentration and pH. Six experiments were carried out in this report testing for microbial growth against different environmental factors. Good aseptic techniques were used to prevent contamination, resulting in a uniform set of results that are in line with the literature.