Bacterial Reproduction

Knowledge of bacterial reproduction is important to understand causes of disease and even death to unsuspecting organisms. For example, contamination of beef by Escherichia coli caused the death of several persons within the past few years. Unfortunately, the recall of contaminated meats is common in the news.

• How does Escherichia coli harm a person?
• What preventive measures can be used to protect against E. coli contamination?

Salmonella poisoning is common at church picnics and often this makes the news as well.

• How does Salmonella harm a person?
• What preventive measures can be used to protect against Salmonella contamination?
• What children's pets carry Salmonella?

Knowledge of factors affecting bacterial reproduction is also beneficial. We use bacteria to produce pharmaceuticals such as vitamins and antibiotics. The food industry uses bacteria to produce yogurt and cheeses. Bacteria that contain magnetic particles may be mass cultured to produce particles to make magnetic tapes.

• In this latter example, speculate on the methods that would be employed in harvesting these magnetic particles from these bacteria.
• Why do you think that these bacteria have magnetic particles in the first place?

Transgenic bacteria are used to produce human insulin. This has many positive impacts on diabetics simply because they are given human insulin that is better accepted than insulin extracted from pig pancreases. To learn more about transgenic research, go to this location.