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On completion of the course students should be able to:
1. Relate the discovery of micro-organisms to ubiquity, pleiomorphism
and spontaneous generation.
2. Establish the role of micro-organisms in geochemical processes,
biotechnology, and disease by applying Koch's Postulates.
3. Describe the connections between basic principles of chemistry and
cell organization.
4. Describe the connection between DNA structure and it's functions.
5. Explain the workings of protein synsthesis and the relationship
between protein structure and function.
6. Describe the current model of the cell membrane.
7. Describe the chemical basis for the functional unity of cells.
8. Explain why the division of life into procaryotes and eucaryotes
is the great divide evolutionarily.
9. Sterilize various media using a variety of techniques.
10. Construct appropriate culture media.
11. Grow cells in pure culture.
12. Construct and analyze a standard growth curve.
13. Identify various types of micro-organisms by microscopy and staining.
14. Biotype various procaryotes.
15. Isolate novel organisms using enrichment culture.
16. Prepare, innoculatate, monitor and harvest a biofermenter.
17. Isolate and transfer plasmids.
18. Select for and isolate recombinant cultures.
19. Titrate and identify a virus.
20. Isolate and identify members of the normal human microbial flora.
21. Test the effects of antibiotics on bacterial cell cultures.
22. Define genotype and phenotype in molecular terms.
23. Define mutation and natural selection and explain their role in
microbial evolution.
24. Define recombination.
25. Explain the role of mobile genetic elements in recombination.
26. Describe transformation, conjugation, and transduction and relate to
recombination.
27. Describe the role of enzymes in recombination.
28. Explain the strategies for selecting and isolating recombinants.
29. Describe environment's role in determining nature of microbial
population.
30. Explain the "antibiotic paradox".
31. Describe the discovery of the connection between virus and disease.
32. Define virus and place it in the hierarchy of biological organization.
33. Explain the interaction of virus and cells.
34. Relate virus cell interactions to antiviral vaccination and antiviral
chemotherapy.
35. Describe the eradication of small pox and polio.
36. Describe the role of virus in biotechnology.
37. Explain the special interaction of virus and host genome in lysogeny
and retro virus.
38. Relate the biochemical nature of micro-organism to difficulties in
their taxonomy.
39. Compare and contrast traditional and modern methods of taxonomy.
40. Describe the taxonomy of some representative groups of procaryotes
i.e. mycobacterium, lactobacillus.
41. Define symbiosis and explain its evolutionary origins.
42. Explain how symbiosis shifts the emphasis in disease from parasite
to host.
43. Describe some major symbiotic interactions i.e. nitrogen fixation.
44. Explain the role of the normal flora in disease.
45. Describe how mechanisms of pathogenicity are defined and
investigated.
46. Define and describe epidemiology.
47. Relate modern taxonomy to epidemiology and biotechnology.
48. Describe the basic structures and functions of non-specific
resistance factors in disease.
49. Define and describe the immune system.
50. Relate various immune functions to disease resistance.
51. Predict advances in management of infectious disease based on
immune function.
52. Define vaccination and differentiate among various vaccine
types.
53. Compare vaccination against viral disease to vaccination against
diseases caused by procaryotic and eucaryotic cells.
54. Relate techniques in microbial genetics to advances in biotechnology.
55. Relate enrichment culture techniques to biotechnology.
56. Relate wine making to traditional and modern fermentation technology.
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1. Historical development
1. The pre-microbial world.
2. Evolution of ubiquity.
3. The discovery of microbial world and the development of the
microscope.
4. Pasteur's discovery of life without air.
5. Wine and the transformation of organic matter.
6. Spontaneous generation and pleiomorphism.
7. Koch's Postulates establish causability.
8. Superficiality of the classical model.
9. Contribution of biochemistry and molecular biology to
microbiology. Biotyping. Procaryotes and eucaryotes introduced.
2. Cell biology
1. Atomic structure and molecular shape, high and low energy bonds
in mucleic acids and proteins, free energy, activation energy,
equilibria cells obey the laws of chemistry.
2. Lipids, membranes and cells.
3. DNA, RNA, Protein: Structure and functions.
4. ATP synthesis and cell work.
5. The eucaryotic cell - structure and function.
6. The procaryotic cell - structure and function.
a) Place of virus in hierarchy of organization.
3. Methodology
1. Various methods of a sterilization: including heat and
filtration.
2. Various media and their construction and utilization.
3. Various methods of obtaining pure cultures.
4. Staining and microscopy.
5. Analysis and manipulation of growth: the standard curve.
6. Enrichment culture.
7. Fermentation: theory and practice.
8. Isolation of mutants and recombinants.
9. Virus titration.
4. Microbial genetics
1. Genome and phenotype.
2. Mutation, selection, adaptation.
3. Recombination.
a) mobile genetic elements (virus, plasmid, etc.).
b) enzymes and mechanisms.
c) isolation and identification of recombinants.
4. The environment and the genome.
a) The antibiotic paradox.
5. Virus
1. Definitions and historical background.
2. Interactions with cells.
a) retrovirus and lysogeny.
3. Viral disease.
a) vaccination and treatment: the eradication of small pox
and polio.
b) HIV disease.
6. Taxonomy
1. Problems intrensic to taxonomy.
2. Traditional verus modern approaches.
3. Taxonomy of selected groups.
7. Symbiosis
1. Evolutionary origins.
2. Specific types i.e. nitrogen fixation, cellulose digestion.
3. Impact on our model of infectious disease.
8. Infectious disease
1. Role of normal flora.
2. Mechanisms of pathogencity.
3. Epidemiology.
4. Role of the host in disease.
a) Non-specific resistance.
b) Immune system.
c) Factors influencing host resistance.
5. Vaccination.
9. Applied microbiology
1. Modern biotechnology or "genetic" engineering.
2. Enrichment culture in biotechnology.
3. Traditional enrichment and fermentatioon biology. Wine
and cheese.
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THE MICROBIAL WORLD: 5th edition, by Roger Y. Stanier, Prentice-Hall,
1986.
INTRODUCTION TO MICROBIOLOGY: 1st edition, by John and Catherine Ingrahan,
Wadsworth, 1995
