Table of Contents

• Section 1. How the Vibrio population grows
• 1: What causes cholera?
• 2: Build the basic growth equation
• 3: Draw exponential growth
• Section 2. So why isn't Frank dead already?
• 4: How long until 1 million bacteria?
• 5: All we need now is data
• 6: Looking at data
• 7: Log transform straightens out exponential growth
• 8: Do ALL curves get "straightened" by taking the log?
• 9: Phases of bacterial growth
• Section 3. How can we tell when the population is growing exponentially?
• 10: A test for exponential growth
• 11: And the answer is...
• 12: To recap
• 13: Some more practice
• 14: Extended problem: Exponential growth ends
• Review
• 15: Summary

Phases of bacterial growth

Now that you can recognize exponential growth easily, let's explore our data on the log-transformed graph. In the applet below, you can move the slider around the graph to find the 4 "phases" of bacterial growth in a lab culture.

Which is the only phase that involves growth of the bacterial population?