2. We learned that a large portion of your microbial flora on your skin are the

Question

2. We learned that a large portion of your microbial flora on your skin are the gram-positive rods Propionibacteriaceae, but when we looked at skin cultures from General Microbiology, we saw almost exclusively gram positive cocci. Tell me why this might happen. What are the potential flaws of our sampling for bacteria? What could we do differently to get a more accurate picture of which microbes are living on us? (I'm giving you half of a page for this answer, so m ake it multi-faceted and do a little research).

Explanation / Answer

There are many steps to iolate and culture the bacteria present on the skin or on any other sample.

We first need to isolate them and grow them properly in a broth taking care that it does not get contaminated, after it has grown fully, we need to make dilutions by carefully pipetting the solutions and then finally plate it.

If a sample is taken directly and visualized on the slide then counting or plating error can occur. sometimes the shape of the bacteria could be mistaken because we might be seeing a highly contaminated sample or debris. In such a case where we are not seeing our presumptive result, then we should take the sample again and grow it. We can also confirm our results by showing it to other technicians or by we can write possible or probable before the results.

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