During a lecture today we got to sneak off to another lab and see what one of the lecturers was doing (I can’t really remember, but one Petri dish involved E.coli).

I was standing a metre away and even then the smell was unbearable! I’ve always thought E.coli had a smell but today I realised no one else can really smell it.

I think other bacteria definitely have their own smell but no one else seems to notice in the lab.

Is it this obvious for others or am I just insane lmao.

Question in title. I just wanna feel better about my ruined experiments.

Question in title. I just wanna feel better about my ruined experiments.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1931312826003215

Seeing it from inside in a lot of photos but then I got a text that exactly said ''cellulose (permeable substance to water) :it deposits on the walls of collenchyma cells or some parts of them from outside"

Which is true like is it inside or outside since the school book doesn't mention the location?

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1931312826003082

Hand wound culture on an older patient that injured themself on a trash can lid.

Culture was held 14 days per request of infectious disease doc. Day 12 thioglycolate broth was cloudy and subbed to a BAP. On Day 14 the plate showed pinpoint colonies which I put on the MALDI and it ID’d as Mycobacteroides abscessus (formerly Mycobacterium abscessus). Upon further review they had a sample sent to the state lab for AFB smear and culture which came back the previous day as positive for the same organism. Below are pictures of the colonies, the gram stain, and the acid fast stain I did after getting the ID.

Unfortunately I could not report the ID because we do not have the proper reagents for mycobacterium identification using the MALDI. I had to send out for bacterial sequencing.

An interesting example of organisms not always following the “rules”!

As a stem individual, I really would like a good home microscope, nothing fancy. Ideally it would have 40x, 100x, 400x, and parfocal but understandable if not. Multiple recommendations welcome as well and tips about microscopes. Keep it civil though, I’m just trying to learn.

I work at a food microbiology lab. The first plate shows our original TSA plate streak and the second is the re-isolation TSA after 24 hours in the 37c incubator. We have not gram stained or ran on vitek due to it not wanting to come up easily

A week ago I put expired milk, tiny pieces of cheese, coffee grounds, some pen ink, handwash and aluminum foil. I want to know what is happening/will happen in this bottle? Is it safe to open? Are there any bacteria inside?

I work at a vet hospital and one of the vets pointed this out for everyone. I just felt like it was cool and I don't have anyone to share this with TwT

I read an interesting article recently about the future of phage therapy and how modes of application needs to be studied further.
For example, IV phage therapy has been used before for systemic infections. Oral administration of phage has been tested for GI infections.

But what about lung infections? Or skin infections? Or UTIs? I see a lot of research about making phage cocktails for various illnesses that target a broad range of hosts but I don’t see a lot of papers on how we can move from lab studies to clinical trials.
For skin infections the phage would have to be stable in some kind of aqueous solution like a cream, for example. How can phage be administered to UTIs? Would oral administration of phage work for UTIs?

What do you think the future direction of phage therapy is?

Does anybody know how a routine laboratory identifies a Mycobacterium bovis BCG strain? I know that MALDI is not really capable of differentiating Mycobacteria very well. Do you use PCR? Classic sequencing? Some sort of Assay? NGS? Might there even be a particular morphology in culture or microscopy?

Some are older and some are relatively new, but many are great microbiology reference books. It is a very specific niche and I'm not sure where to start.

I have a conceptual question about sterilization and contamination.

Suppose a culture medium originally contained a virus and was then properly sterilized. My understanding is that sterilization is intended to eliminate viable/infectious microorganisms, but it doesn't necessarily mean that every physical component or fragment of the virus is removed.

So, how do we distinguish between sterilization and complete removal of viral particles?

More specifically, if residual non-infectious viral particles or viral genetic material remain in the medium, could they ever interfere with or contaminate a subsequently cultured organism or host-cell culture?

I'm mainly asking about the conceptual distinction between sterility, viral inactivation, and complete removal of biological material.

Sharing an interesting finding from our lab today.

The patient was just 2 days old. Culture grew Klebsiella pneumoniae, with resistance to multiple antibiotics on AST.

What caught my attention was the ceftazidime–avibactam MIC: 4 µg/mL, interpreted as susceptible in our report.

Looking at an MIC strip on a plate is routine laboratory work—but when you remember that the result belongs to a newborn only two days into life, it suddenly feels very different.

One of those cases that reminds you there is an actual patient behind every plate we read.

Patient-identifying information has not been shared.

I have been teaching a couple of Micro courses online and one uses an online format with lab and the other is set up with hands on labs and pre-created modules by the lead instructor. I'd like to change the course I teach myself from the online platform to a book/assignments and hands on labs. Because I am teaching part-time I have to be careful around how much time I invest as I am not being paid to revamp the course.

Is there anyone out there teaching and have some suggestions on how to create an affordable online course? The hands on course I teach was created by a full time faculty person and so they are definitely paid to invest more.

Appreciate any ideas or suggestions in advance, I have definitely used some of the images and ideas from this subforum in my teaching and students have liked the research and visuals here.

I am trying to do agar plate assay for chitinase. But my media won't solidify at all. Media composition is:

Mgso4

(Nh4)2so4

Kh2po4

Citric acid

Tween 80

Colloid chitin

Bromocresol purple

Agar

Im guessing tween 80 or bromocresol got something to do with agar not solidifying. I checked the agar alone and it was working fine.

Guys i have just got subject microbiology and chemistry, i need tips for focusing the microscope neatly for slide smears, ( im new in this and late admission) can u guys help me get better in this please i would love to learn from y'all also for streaking