What is Microorganisms ? Friend And Foe

What is microorganism ?

Organ­ism around us which we nor­mal­ly can­not see with our naked eye these are called micro organ­ism or microbes. The microor­gan­isms or microbes are small in size that they can­not be seen with the unaid­ed eye. Some of these such as fun­gus that grow on bread can even see with a mag­ni­fy­ing glass. Oth­ers can­not be seen with­out the help of a micro­scope. That is why these are called microor­gan­ism or microbes. 

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Microbes

Microorganism are classified into four major groups

  1. Bac­te­ria
  2. Fun­gi
  3. Pro­to­zoa
  4. Algae

Virus­es are more also micro­scop­ic but are dif­fer­ent from oth­er microor­gan­ism. They how­ev­er repro­duce only inside the cells of host organ­ism which may be a bac­teri­um plant or an animal. 

Where do microorganism live ? 

Micro organ­isms may be sin­gle celled like bac­te­ria some algae and pro­to­zoa or mul­ti­cel­lu­lar such as many algae and fun­gi. They live in all types of envi­ron­ment rang­ing from Ice cold cli­mate to hot springs and desert to Marshy lands. They are also found inside the bod­ies of ani­mals includ­ing humans. Some microor­gan­ism grow on the oth­er organ­ism while oth­er exist freely. 

Microorganisms and US 

Microor­gan­isms play an impor­tant role in our life some of them are ben­e­fi­cial in many ways where­as some oth­ers are harm­ful and cause disease. 

Friendly microorganisms

Bac­te­ria are also used in prepa­ra­tion of med­i­cines. They are also used in clean­ing the envi­ron­ment. In agri­cul­ture they are used to increase soil fer­til­i­ty by fix­ing nitro­gen. Curd con­tain sev­er­al microor­gan­ism. The bac­teri­um lac­to­bacil­lus pro­mote the for­ma­tion of curd. Bac­te­ria also involved in mak­ing of cheese pick­les and many oth­er food items. An impor­tant ingre­di­ent of Rava Idli and bhatu­ra is curd. Bac­te­ria and yeast are also help­ful for fer­men­ta­tion of rice Idli and dosa batter. 

Commercial use of microorganisms 

Micro organ­isms are used for the large scale pro­duc­tion of alco­hol wine and acetic acid. Yeast is used for com­mer­cial pro­duc­tion of alco­hol and wine. For this pur­pose East is grown on nat­ur­al Sug­ars present in brains like Bar­ley wheat, rice, crushed fruit juices etc. 

Medicinal use of microorganisms 

The source of antibi­ot­ic med­i­cine is micro organ­ism. These med­i­cines kill or stop the growth of dis­ease caus­ing microor­gan­isms such med­i­cines are called antibi­otics. Strep­to­mycin Ery­thromycin are some of the com­mon­ly known antibi­ot­ic which are made from fun­gi and bacteria. 

Vaccine

If dead aur weak microbes are intro­duced into a healthy body the body fights and kills the invad­ing bac­te­ria by prod­uct using suit­able anti­bod­ies. These anti­bod­ies remain in the body and we pro­tect it from the dis­ease caus­ing microor­gan­isms for­ev­er. This is how vac­cine work sev­er­al dis­eases includ­ing Cholera tuber­cu­lo­sis small­pox and hepati­tis can be pre­vent­ed by vaccination. 

Increasing soil fertility 

Some bac­te­ria are able to fix nitro­gen from the atmos­phere to enrich the soil with nitro­gen and increase its fer­til­i­ty this microbes are com­mon­ly called bio­log­i­cal nitro­gen fixers. 

Harmful microorganisms

Microorganisms are harmful in many ways .

  • Some of the microor­gan­ism cause dis­ease in human beings plants and ani­mals such dis­ease caus­ing microor­gan­isms are called pathogens .
  • Some microor­gan­isms fall food cloth­ing and Leather. 

Disease causing microorganisms 

  • Com­mon cold and cough are caused by viruses. 
  • Seri­ous dis­eases like polio and chick­en­pox are also caused by viruses. 
  • Dis­eases like dysen­tery and malar­ia are caused by protozoa. 
  • Typhoid and tuber­cu­lo­sis are bac­te­r­i­al diseases. 

Note - Micro­bial dis­ease that can spread from an infect­ed per­son to a healthy per­son through air water food or phys­i­cal con­tact are called com­mu­ni­ca­ble dis­ease. Exam­ples of such dis­eases include Cholera com­mon cold chick­en pox and tuberculosis. 

When a per­son suf­fer­ing from com­mon cold sneezes fine droplets of water car­ry­ing thou­sands of virus­es are spread in the air. The virus may enter the body of a healthy per­son while breath­ing and cause infec­tion. They are some insects and ani­mals which act as car­ri­er of dis­ease caus­ing microor­gan­isms. House­fly is one of the career. The Flies set on the garbage and ani­mal exc­re­ta pathogen stick to their bod­ies when the slice it on uncov­ered food they may trans­fer the pathogens who­ev­er eat the con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed food is like­ly to get sick so it is advis­able to always keep food cov­ered avoid con­sum­ing uncov­ered items of food. Anoth­er exam­ple of car­ri­er is female Anophe­les Mos­qui­to. It car­ries the par­a­site of Malar­ia plas­mod­i­um female ades mos­qui­to act as car­ri­er of dengue virus. 

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