Microbes and their Building Blocks Flashcards
What is microbiology?
The study of living things that are too small to see without magnification
What are some types of microorganisms?
Bacteria, algae, protozoa, archaea
Helminths
Are multicellular animals whose mature state can be visible to the naked eye and cause human infection
Bacteria, archaea, fungi, and protozoa
Are cellular microorganisms
Viruses and prions
Acellular microorganisms that can cause human disease
What is a virus? what are there characteristics?
Can infect all living cells. They are,
parasitic, protein-coated genetic elements, dependent on their infected hosts, connected with the evolution of microbes and humans
Ubitiquous
Present Everywhere at all times
Microbes(microorganism) characteristics
Reproduce rapidly
Can be quickly grown in large populations
Cannot be seen directly ~micro size
Microscopes and other indirect means are used to study them
LCA
Least common ancestor gave rise to three different “offspring” of microorganisms- Bacteria, archaea, eukaryote
Prokaryotes(pre-nucleus)
Bacteria and archaea have been on this planet for about 3.5 billion years-essential to the growth and adaptation of the planet in that time
Eukaryotes(true nucleus)
Arose after prokaryotes about 1.8 billion years ago, eventually evolved into multicellular animals
Anoxygenic photosynthesis
The conversion of light energy from carbon dioxide into organic material that did not produce oxygen
Oxygenic photosynthesis
The conversion of light energy from carbon dioxide into organic material that does produce oxygen
-the source of oxygen
-led to the use of oxygen to breathe(allowed for diversification)
-photosynthetic microorganisms account for 70 percent of Earth’s photosynthesis
Microorganisms shape our planet
Produces gases that drive structure of content of soil, water, and atmosphere
influencing weathering, mineral extraction, and soil formation
bacteria and fungi aid plants in obtaining nutrients and protect against diseases
Biotechnology
Humans manipulate microorganisms in an industrial setting to make products
Genetic engineering
An area of biotechnology that manipulates the genetics of microbes, plants, and animals for creating new products and genetically modified organisms(GMOs)
Recombinant DNA technology
The transfer of genetic material from one organism to another to deliberately alter the DNA and produce a specific product
Bioremediation
The use of microorganisms, naturally occurring or artificial to restore stability in an ecosystem or clean up toxic pollutants
What is a pathogen?
Microbes that cause diseases
What is an infectious disease?
any disease that is caused by a microbe
Infectious diseases
-most common cause of death in the US and worldwide
-W.H.O. estimates there to be 10 billion new infections caused every year by microorganisms
-death toll is approximately 13 million people worldwide
New(emerging) infectious diseases
AIDS, Hepatitis C, viral encephalitis,
Old(re-emerging) infectious diseases
Tuberculosis
Microbial causing diseases
gastric ulcers, diabetes, schizophrenia
Chronic infectious diseases(bacterial or viral)
Multiple sclerosis, obsessive-compulsive disorder, coronary artery disease, obesity
What is spontaneous generation?
The belief that invisible vital forces that are present in matter led to the creation of life
What is abiogenesis?
A-without
bio-life
genesis-beginning
beginning in absence of life
Was still widely accepted and embraced spontaneous generation
What is biogenesis?
Beginning with life.
living things only arise from others of the same kind
Who was Louis Pasteur?
An acclaimed microbiologist and chemist who disproved the theory of spontaneous generation by his Swan Neck Flask Experiment
What was the swan neck flask experiment?
Louis Pasteur was able to prove that microbes were the cause of fermentation in foods and drink. by filling a flask with broth, shaping the neck into a long tube at which microbes could not come into contact with the broth sitting in the flask, then sterilizing the flask and allowing it to sit had allowed him to determine that microbes were the cause of fermentation in food/drink
Who was Antoine Van Leeuwenhoek?
A linen merchant and self-made microbiologist that manufactured simple microscopes in order to see the thread of his fabrics. He became fascinated and eventually went on to analyze rainwater and smaller bacteria that came from the teeth of himself and others discovering the tiny organisms we now identify as microbes
What is the definition of sterile?
completely free of all life forms including viruses and spores
Who came up with the germ theory of disease?
Louis Pasteur
What is the germ theory of disease?
A theory that first originated in the 1800s that proposed that microorganisms could be the cause of diseases
Who was Robert Koch?
A german country doctor who established 4 postulates to prove the germ theory of disease.
Koch’s postulates isolated and identified bacteria from many diseases that would eventually help to identify 20 different diseases between 1875-1900
What are Koch’s 4 postulates?
- The same microorganisms are present in every case of the disease
- the microorganisms are isolated from the tissues of a dead animal, and a pure culture is prepared
- microorganisms from the pure culture are inoculated into a healthy, susceptible, animal and the disease is reproduced
- The identical microorganism are isolated and recultivated from the tissue specimens of the experimental animal
What is nomenclature?
The assignment of scientific names to various taxonomic categories and to individual organisms
What is binomial nomenclature?
A scientific name that is a combination of the genus and species names
Scientific names are italicized when typed and underlined when they are written
What are the categories of classification in taxonomic naming?
Domain, kingdom, phylum/division, class, order, family, genus, species
What are the names of the five kingdoms in the Whittaker/Haeckel kingdom system?
Darwin and Haeckel-plants and animals
Haeckel-Protista
1870’s Haeckel-Monera(Prokaryotes)
1959-1969 Whittaker-Fungi
What is phylogeny?
The scheme that represents the natural relatedness(by descent) between groups of living beings
What did Carl Woese discover?
Woese discovered that the small subunit ribosomal RNA sequence(ssu rRNA/ 16S rRNA) was nearly identical in organisms within each species
What is the Woese-Fox System of Domains?
The discovery of a significantly different ssu rRNA of bacteria and eukaryotes and the ssu rRNA of archaebacteria led to the addition of a domain to the taxonomic kingdom
What are the three domains in the taxonomic hierarchy?
Bacteria, Archaea, and Eukarya
Which of the following is not considered a microbe?
A. bacterium
B. Alga
C. mushroom
D. protozoan
C. mushroom
Because mushrooms are apart of the fungi kingdom, they are not microscopic. They cannot be microbes if they are able to be seen with the naked eye.
Diseases such as heart disease, gastric ulcers, diabetes, and multiple sclerosis have a microbial cause.
True or False
False.
Gastric ulcers and diabetes have a microbial cause whereas heart diseases and multiple sclerosis are linked to chronic infections with bacteria or viruses
The scientist known as the “Father of Microbiology” who first identified a microbe under his own microscope was:
A. Louis Pasteur
B. Robert Koch
C. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
D. Ignaz Semmelweis
C. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
Leeuwenhoek was the first to analyze microorganisms from a simple microscope through a lens that he sanded down to get a better look at his threads in his fabrics. He looked at bacteria from the teeth of himself and others
Pasteur’s Swan Neck Flask Experiment finally put to rest the theory of:
A. Genetic theory of hereditary
B. Theory of immunity
C. Spontaneous generation
D. Molecular theory of life
C. Spontaneous generation
Louis Pasteur’s experiment disproved the theory about spontaneous generation because it proved that microbes were fermenting food/drink when they had easy access to contaminate and multiple. With the swan neck experiment, the swan neck of the flask proved that microbes could not contaminate the sterile environment due to gravity, therefore postulating the theory of abiogenesis/spontaneous generation
The germ theory was formally standardized by the protocol developed by:
A. Louis Pasteur
B. Robert Koch
C. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
D. Florey and Fleming
B. Robert Koch
Robert Koch came up with Koch’s postulates that helped microbiologists isolate and identify bacteria from many diseases. His four step theory helped to prove the origin of diseases and how to combat them, anthrax was one of the diseases he helped to eradicate.
Which of the following is not a domain of the Woese-Fox system of taxonomy?
A. Protista
B. Eukarya
C. Archaea
D. Bacteria
A. Protista
Protista was added to the five kingdom taxonomic hierarchy created by Darwin/Haeckel/Whittaker, it is not apart of the domain.
The three domains are Bacteria, Archaea, and Eukarya
