• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Privacy Policy
  • Trending Worldwide
  • Careers

Bom Boh

enthusiasm for knowledge

Ad example

Here’s What Happens When You Culture the Bacteria on an Eight-Year-Old’s Hand

by David Walker Leave a Comment

ShareTweet
A handprint from an eight-year-old boy after he came in from playing outside Tasha Sturm, Cabrillo College via ASM

The world is teaming with microbes. That fact is never so graphically apparent as when someone actually takes the time to culture the bacteria and yeast growing on everything — from pillowcases to toiletsto eyeballs. Fortunately many of these microbes are vital to human health. So perhaps this photo of the stuff previously living on an eight-year-old boy’s hand can be appreciated rather than reviled. 

The Facebook page for the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) recently shared a photo of a large bacterial culture plate bearing a handprint made of microbial colonies taken by Tasha Sturm. Sturm, who works as a lab tech at Cabrillo College in California, created the evocative culture by pressing her son’s hand into an agar plate after he was playing outside. Agar is commonly used to culture microbes because it provides a nutrient-rich base for microorganisms to grow. She posted the hand print microbe portrait at MicrobeWorld.org, run by the ASM.

Sturm explains in detail how the plate needs to be cultured and incubated to get the best results — apparently some of the colonies of yeast and fungi only take on color when they are grown at room temperature. Sturm has printed both of her kids’ hands for a few years now and saves the results for microbiology classes at the college. She explained more in an email to Smart News:

I used to do my daughter’s hand until her hand became too big for the large plates and then started doing my son. I save the plates and give it to the instructors to use as a demo for the class. My kids think it is “cool” and the students like it as well.

Determining the exact species would require some more testing, but Sturm added some tentative IDs in the comment section of the original post. White colonies are probably a form of Staphylococcus, which lives in people’s noses and skin. Most strains are harmless or even beneficial but some can cause disease when they grow where they shouldn’t, especially when they develop antibiotic resistance.  Sturm also posted two close ups of colonies that are either species of Bacillus — a common soil bacterium, though one species is responsible for making feet stinky — or a yeast.

Researchers are still working to explain exactly what this abundance of microbes on the body and its stunning diversity means for human health and disease. But one thing that is increasingly evident is that a germ-laden hand is perfectly normal and can even be beautiful.

Facebook Comments Box

Filed Under: Plants Tagged With: bacteria, Culture

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

More to See

Buddhist monk dedicates his life to saving thousands of stray dogs

By David Walker

Despondent, Starving Pup Dozes on Sidewalk Until Charitable Woman Offers Assistance

By David Walker

Alligators Do The Smartest Thing To Survive Freezing Winter

By David Walker

We Are all Familiar with Rainbows, But Have You Ever Witnessed a Moonbow—a Nighttime Rainbow Lighted By The Moon?

By David Walker

Mandarin duck

By David Walker

Abandoned Tarantula Hangs Out In City Park Until Help Arrives

By David Walker

Woman Makes Peace With A Little Mouse Who Moved Into Her Home

By David Walker

Footer

Bom Boh

We Love Animals give you the news that truly matters to you. Read, look and share the things you are interested in. Welcome!

Recent

  • King Alfred’s Tower
  • Amazing colorized photos that bring 1930s America to life
  • The Amazing Engineering of Ancient Roman Roads
  • Discovering Just Enough Room Island, Earth’s Tiniest Inhabited Island
  • Moai

Search

Copyright © 2023 · Magazine Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in