A petri dish is inoculated with a single bacterium and the intrinsic rate of inc

Question

A petri dish is inoculated with a single bacterium and the intrinsic rate of increase for the species is 0.5.

a. What will the size of the population be after 10 generations?

b. How often will the population double, if the rate of increase remains constant?

c. If the petri dish can hold one million bacteria, what will the rate of increase be after 25 generations?

d. The rate of resource use by the first species is 2 units/individual. A second species is added to the petri dish that uses resources at a rate of 3 units/individual and has a carrying capacity of 750,000. What will be the end result of adding in the second species of bacteria (i.e., will one species out-compete the other or will they co-exist)?

Explanation / Answer

a) bacterial population increase in exponential fashion like 2,4,8,6.... so on, after 10 generations population become 32 bacteria.

b) When the relative growth rate is constant, the bacteria undergoes exponential growth and has a constant doubling time or period. e.g 20 min for E.coli.

c) we can calculate using formula 2n where 'n' is number of generations, so 225 = 33,554,432 bacterial cell as expected, but after reaching one million increase will undergo stationary phase and then increase stop due to scarity of nutrient, space, and there will be competetion too.

d) often bacteria do not compete easily if they have succient nutrient supply and space, sometimes co-exist untill all nutrient furnished. but if they inhibitory in nature then 2 unit/individual species may compete-out 3 unit/individual species because first species may survive at lower rate of resources compared to second species.

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