Microorganisms play important roles in addressing climate change, pollution, and pandemics. They help remove carbon from the air, degrade air and water pollutants through biofilm formation, and assist in vaccine development. Microbes also critically impact human health and survival through roles in the digestive system, on the skin, and in maintaining a diverse gut microbiome. While microbiology provides benefits, its principles and technologies could be exploited to cause harm if water treatment is inadequate or pathogenic microbes are released.

1. The Significance and
Practical Applications of
MICROBIOLOGY in Relation
to BIOTECHNOLOGY
GROUP 2

2. Questions
and
Answers

3. 1. Explain how microbes contribute
in solving these current global
problems:
a. Climate Change
b. Air/water/land pollution
c. Pandemics

4. A. Climate Change
Prochlorococcus and Synechococcus are
single celled cyanobacteria. Researchers
estimate that Prochlorococcus and
Synechococcus remove about 10 billion
tons of carbon from the air each year; this is
about two-thirds of the total carbon fixation
that occurs in the oceans.

5. Prochlorococcus and Synechococcus

6. B. Air/Water/Land Pollution
Air Pollution
When applied to air filtration and purification,
biofilters use microorganisms to remove air
pollution. The air flows through a packed bed and
the pollutant transfers into a thin biofilm on the
surface of the packing material. Microorganisms,
including bacteria and fungi are immobilized in the
biofilm and degrade the pollutant. Trickling filters
and bioscrubbers rely on a biofilm and the bacterial
action in their recirculating waters.

8. B. Air/Water/Land Pollution
Water Pollution
 To clean this Polluted water, it is put through the
process of bioremediation, or the use of
microorganisms to treat water that has been
contaminated by hazardous materials. Water that has
been cleaned by this method can then be released into
the environment or even reused.
 One method of bioremediation is called biogenic
hydrogen sulfide precipitation technology.

10. B. Air/Water/Land Pollution
Land Pollution
Bacteria and fungi are usually most abundant in the
rhizosphere, the area around the root where exudates
are most abundant. By decomposing organic matter
they play an essential role in controlling and making
inorganic mineral nutrients available for plant uptake.
Bacteria in the soil are essential in the cycling of
nitrogen, carbon, phosphorus and sulfur. They also
assist in making other major mineral nutrients such as
potassium, magnesium, and iron available for plant
uptake.

12. C. Pandemics
Scientific experiments which unravel the cause of influenza,
had immediate preventative applications. They would assist in
the effort to create a effective vaccine to prevent influenza.
This was the ultimate goal of most studies,
since vaccines were thought to be the best preventative
solution in the early 20th century. Several experiments
attempted to produce vaccines, each with a different
understanding of the etiology of fatal influenza infection. The
vaccines made for the British forces took a similar approach
and were "mixed vaccines" of pneumococcus and lethal
streptococcus. The vaccine development therefore focused on
the culture results of what could be isolated from the sickest
patients and lagged behind the scientific progress.

14. 2. Identify and explain three critical
roles microbes play in human
health and survival?

15. Microbes on Digestive System
Not all microbes in the digestive system are beneficial.
Bacteria, viruses and fungi can all cause intestinal
infections. These illnesses are often accompanied by
diarrhea and inflammation of the stomach and
intestines. Infection by harmful bacteria can occur in
several ways.

17. Microbes on the Skin
 Bacteria can cause skin lesions, inflammation or boils.
Infection of the skin by a virus can result in warts, as is
the case with Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) and plantar
warts. Athlete’s foot and jock itch are two examples of
fungal infections of the skin.
…

18. Athlete’s Foot

19. Jock Itch

20. Previous studies have shown that the intensive
treatment given to individuals receiving a stem
cell transplant from a healthy donor can destroy
a significant portion of the recipients’ gut
microbiota and reduce its overall diversity.

21. 3. Can you think of negative
consequences if the principles and
technology of microbiology will be
exploited in the wrong way?

22. Surface Water Treatment Technique
Microbiological Contaminants
 If water is inadequately treated, microbiological
contaminants in that water may cause disease.
Disease symptoms may include diarrhea, cramps,
nausea, and possibly jaundice, and any associated
headaches and fatigue. These symptoms, however,
are not just associated with disease-causing
organisms in drinking water, but also may be
caused by a number of factors other than your
drinking water contaminants.

23. `

24. Total coliform
 Total coliform bacteria are common in the environment
(soil or vegetation) and are generally harmless. If a lab
detects only total coliform bacteria in drinking water,
the source is probably environmental and fecal
contamination is unlikely. However, if environmental
contamination can enter the system, pathogens could
get in too. It is important to find and resolve the source
of the contamination.

25. Fecal Coliforms/E. coli
The presence of these bacteria in drinking water
generally is a result of a problem with water
treatment or the pipes which distribute the water,
and indicates that the water may be contaminated
with organisms that can cause disease.

27. 4. Discuss at least three possible
ways where the applications in this
field can help alleviate if not solve
the economic problems in our
country.

28. Nitrogen fixation
 is a process found only in some bacteria which
removes N2from the atmosphere and converts it to
ammonia (NH3), for use by plants and animals.
Nitrogen fixation also results in replenishment of soil
nitrogen removed by agricultural processes.

29. Oxygenic photosynthesis
 occurs in plants, algae and cyanobacteria. It is the
type of photosynthesis that results in the
production of O2 in the atmosphere. At least 50
percent of the O2 on earth is produced by
photosynthetic microorganisms, and for at least a
billion years before plants evolved, microbes were
the only organisms producing O2 on earth. O2 is
required by many types of organisms, including
animals, in their respiratory processes.

30. Decomposition
results in the breakdown of complex organic materials
to forms of carbon that can be used by other
organisms. There is no naturally-occurring organic
compound that cannot me degraded by some microbe,
although some synthetic compounds such as teflon,
styrofoam, plastics, insecticides and pesticides are
broken down slowly or not at all. Through the
metabolic processes of fermentation and respiration,
organic molecules are eventually broken down to
CO2 which is returned to the atmosphere.

31. 5. Enumerate and explain three
situations where the principles of
microbiology can be applied in
clinical practice of medicine.

32. Making of Medicines

33.  The ability to correlate, evaluate, prioritize and
synthesize information, including the relevant
ethical issues acquired by history taking and
physical examination. The resident should
recognize and define problems and generate
differential diagnosis and problem list.

34.  The performance of molecular methods
applied to the detection of micro-organisms
and their virulence factors and to determine
the epidemiologic links between isolates.