Measuring bacterial growth

Answer 1

Bacterial growth can be measured by different ways: The most obvious way to determine microbial numbers is through direct counting. Using counting chamber like PETROFF-HAUSSER counting chamber and HEMOCYTOMETER ( it is also used for eukaryotic cells). The recent counting technique is flow cytometer, in this bacterial suspension is forced through the a small hole or orifice in the Coulter counter chamber and an electric field is applied through the hole and electrodes are placed on both sides of the orifice every time the microbial cell pass will cut the potential and electrical resistance will be noted, which give the number of cells. Onether technique is the membrane filter technique in which the sample is first filtered through a black polycarbonate membrane filter. Then bacteria are stained with a flouroscent dye such as acridine orange, and observed microscopically. The stained cells are easily observed against the black background of the membrane filter and can be counted when viewed with an epifluorescense microscope. Bacterial growth can also be measured by colony counting method.

Answer 2

A direct chemical method for measuring cell growth is by measuring a chemical component of the cell such as total protein or total DNA content. An indirect measurement measures chemical activity such as the rate of oxygen consumption.

Answer 3

There are different ways of measuring cell growth. The different ways of measuring growth are wet weight, dry weight, absorption and total cell count.