Neal Chamberlain's Gallery of Bacterial Pathogens
The video we watched on Thursday explained how GMOs invade cells by using bacteria, and it got me thinking about bacteria in general. I know there are bacteria on my cutting board and there are bacteria in my yogurt, so my question is: Are there good and bad bacteria?
Most of the time we live in a symbiotic relationship with bacteria, which means each organism benefits by living together. At any given time we have about 200 kinds of bacteria living within our bodies. For example, E. coli bacteria has a place to live in our intestines while helping us to digest our food and produce vitamins. We use the lactobacillus acidophillus bacterium to make yogurt from milk. There is also bacteria that is harmful to plants and humans; they invade cells or produce poisonoius toxins. These are called pathogenic bacteria: anthrax, smallpox are a few examples. So the good bacteria live with us harmoniously, while the bad bacteria can make us very sick. Good hygiene, like frequently washing hands, can help prevent bacteria from entering the body.
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