Microbes And Disease

Question 1

Define disease

Answer 1

Any disorder that produces symptoms and is not the result of an injury

Question 2

Define infection

Answer 2

Disease caused by spread of pathogenic microbes

Question 3

Name 6 ways a pathogen can be transmitted

Answer 3

Touch
Body fluid
Waste
Food
Surfaces
Air

Question 4

Define a bacteria

Answer 4

A single celled microbe that can be harmless, beneficial or pathogenic

Question 5

What are the shapes of bacteria?

Answer 5

Spherical (cocci), rod (bacilli), spiral and other

Question 6

What is a spirochete?

Answer 6

Thin, flexible, spiral-shaped bacteria
Live in mud and animal GI
E.g. leptospira

Question 7

What is a ribrios?

Answer 7

Comma shaped bacteria
Can be anaerobic
E.g. vibrio cholerae

Question 8

Give an example of an aerobic rod/cocci.

Answer 8

Bordatella pertussis
Eschericha coli

Question 9

What is a pyogenic cocci?

Answer 9

Sphere shaped bacteria that causes pus
E.g. staph. Aureus

Question 10

What is an endospore-forming bacteria?

Answer 10

A bacteria that forms endospores (dormant state of the bacteria) which are highly resistant and live on after the bacteria is dead. They are highly transmissible.
E.g. clostridium botulism

Question 11

What is a virus?

Answer 11

Simple, smallest microbe which aims to reproduce
Needs a host

Question 12

How does a virus reproduce?

Answer 12

Invades host cell
Uses cell reproduction mechanisms to copy its own DNA
Leaves cell either by lysis or budding

Question 13

What is cell lysis?

Answer 13

Bursting of the cell resulting in cell death

Question 14

What is budding in terms of viruses?

Answer 14

Virus pushes against cell membrane causing it to envelope the virus into a package

Question 15

What is an enveloped virus?

Answer 15

Virus which has left the host cell via budding
This gives it protection against the hosts immune system
E.g. coronavirus

Question 16

What is a non-enveloped virus?

Answer 16

Leaves the cell via lysis
Does not survive for long outside the body and is susceptible to temperature changes
E.g. norovirus

Question 17

What is a fungi?

Answer 17

Group of spore-producing organisms that can live anywhere and colonise
Infect humans via skin contact or inhalation of spores
May be opportunistic (when immunity is weak) or primary (occurs in normal immunity)
Can cause local and systemic infections

Question 18

What is a mould?

Answer 18

A fungus which has many cells that form long threads (hyphae)

Question 19

What is a yeast?

Answer 19

A fungus which is a single, round cell

Question 20

What is a parasite?

Answer 20

An organism which lives on another and uses it for food
Protozoa: single-cell, in gut, amoeba
Helminth: large, multi-celled, in organs, tapeworm
Ectoparasite: can cause disease in own right, scabies