MICRO-C-OMICS #9: Lets Exchange Some Genes -Transduction

Microorganisms can exchange genetic information, a process commonly called Horizontal Gene Transfer (HGT). Microorganisms do it to adapt changing environments and to evolve so that they can survive. Yet, HGT can also affect our survival, both in a good and bad ways. While transfer of antibiotic resistance genes turns into s a major health crisis, transfer of pollutant degrading genes, for example, helps us to clean the environment. (And we can also make shiny bacteria in the lab to experiment with)

In the previous post I introduced you conjugation as one of the HGT mechanisms. Another way to transfer genes is transduction. During transduction, viruses (called bacteriophages as they go after bacteria) introduce foreign DNA into the DNA of the bacterium. As a result the bacterium may have new traits.

#artscience #cartoon #bacteriophages #phage #transduction #horizontalgenetransfer #antibioticresistance #sciencecomics #bacterialcomics #biofilm #bacteria #geneexhange #microcomics