This is called a bacteriophage. It is a virus that invades bacteria.

Hey y'all. Hope you guys had a amazing thanksgiving. Comment about the food you ate in the comments section. I know I did. Turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, pistacchio salad and ham. My dad bought a whole 18 pound ham for my sister because she doesn't like turkey. The real star of the show was the pie. This week, we started learning about viruses and bacteria. I have a lab you can try at home as well. I find it funny that we waited until cold and flu season to start this section in our book. One thing I found that was interesting was that viruses are not actually living, but are like little grains of sand. They look like robots with two main parts. The protein coat which allows it to attach to cells and the inner core which contains either DNA or RNA but never both. There are no cures for viruses but you can prevent them with vaccines. Vaccines contain a weakened strain of the virus which puts your immune system on alert for the actual threat. Bacteria are very different. There are both good and bad bacteria. The good bacteria help clean up oil spills help digestion and produce food. The bad bacteria cause infection, and illness. You can prevent illness by washing you hands and staying away from sick people. If you do get an illness, you can use antibiotics to kill it. Did two labs that show the growth of bacteria. Here is the one you can do at home. The Bacteria Lab

The bacteria lab

Materials:

• A q-tip
• Petri dish
• Agar
• water
• A dark warm place

Procedure

• Mix the agar with the water
• Pour into the bottom of the petri dish
• Close the dish. It should gain the consistency of jello.
• With the q-tip, swipe it across a surface
• Open the lid of the petri dish to a 45 degree angle
• Swipe the q-tip across the agar, but don't break the surface
• Close the lid and tape it shut. do not open it again as some of the bacteria may be pathogenic
• Place the side of the container with the agar upside down in the warm dark place.
• Over the next four days, you will begin to see white spots appear. These are bacteria colonies
• Count them and record them at two day intervals.