Microbiology
For the first half of each day during the Bio week, we sat down to learn and review about the building blocks of life through Microbiological life. From the basic organic elements, to how cells interact with each other, and how their genetic information can be edited to produce changes in an organism's phenotype.
Some of the topics we touched during this week were:
- Basic elements of Organic Chemistry
- Lipids and Compartmentalisation
- Amino Acid Structure
- Metabolism
- Cellular Respiration
- Glycolisis
- Krebs Cycle
- Classification of microorganisms by Nutrition
- By Information Management
- By Kingdom
- Sequencing DNA
- Microscopes
- Cell Anatomy
- Gene Expression (Central Dogma of Biology)
Growing Bacteria
As our first practical experiment, we created various mediums from which we could sample different kinds of bacteria and watch their growth throughout a period of time. In my case, my group put together a "DIY All Purpose Bacteria Medium" made out of Agar Powder. We had to make sure that our objects and the medium were sterilised so as to get a more precise reading of the sampled bacteria
My sample consisted of taking a swab from inside my mask and comparing it to the inside of someone else's mask. At the time, I was coughing a lot as I was recovering from a cold and so my hypothesis was that I would grow more bacteria inside my mask.
Spirulina
We then proceeded to learn and cultivate Spirulina, a superfood with a tremendous amount of nutrients. We prepared the environment for the Spirulina to live in as well as a medium for Kombucha. We saw the procedure to grow it, maintain it, and cultivate it.
Microscopes
We were given a set of microscopes and were instructed to explore and observe different objects and surfaces. We had a microscope we could attach to our phones (x6 magnification), to our computers (x50-100 magnification), and a couple microscopes Nuria brought from her laboratory (x1,000 magnification)