Question

If your instructor gave you a culture containing one species of a microorganism, how would you be able to tell whether it was an archaean, a bacterium, a fungus, or a protist?

Identify and explain characteristics you could use that would allow you to distinguish amongst these types of microorganisms.

Assume that you would have available any equipment or technologies needed to identify each organism.

Your own words and atleast a paragraph.

Answer 1

First we need to isolate the genetic material of that particular organism. Then polyphasic approach will be the best method for identification. There are many techniques by which we can measure the genetic relatedness with archea, bacteria fungus or protists.

There are several genetic markers to identify the type of microbes. 1. 16s rDNA Sequence for Prokaryotic

2. gyrB, rpoA, rpoB for bacterial identification

3. 26s rDNA sequence, 28s rDNA sequence, beta tubulin gene for fungus identification

4. mcrA gene and 16s rRNA archeal sequence For identifying archea

5. 18s rRNA sequence for identification of protists

After isolation of DNA from organism, we need to sequence the DNA. Then we need to compare the specific sequences with the conserved sequences of every type of organisms. Maximum similarity where will be seen, we can put our unknown organism under that category