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WHAT ARE BACTERIA
Member rating: No Rating | Words: | Submitted: Thu Nov 10 2005
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Bacterial Identification What is a species? For organisms that breed among themselves, such as plants, fungi and animals, a species is defined as: A reproductively isolated group of individuals, whose genes do not combine with those of outsiders. As a result the members of a species are genetically similar * Bacteria don't breed among themselves; they don't reproduce sexually * Instead, bacteria can exchange DNA between organisms that are genetically very dissimilar. WHAT IS A BACTERIAL SPECIES? The only criterion that can be used to define a bacterial species is genetic similarity In general it is assumed that if organisms have nucleotide sequences that are * for more than 60% similar they belong to the same species * for between 60 and 25% similar they belong to the same genus * for less than 25% similar they belong to different genera Conclusion Hybridisation experiments tell us if an unknown bacterium belongs to a specific classification unit (species, genus, family, etc), but not...
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