Читать книгу The Story of Germ Life - H. W. Conn - Страница 14

In shape bacteria are the simplest conceivable structures. Although there are hundreds of different species, they have only three general forms, which have been aptly compared to billiard balls, lead pencils, and corkscrews. Spheres, rods, and spirals represent all shapes. The spheres may be large or small, and may group themselves in various ways; the rods may be long or short, thick or slender; the spirals may be loosely or tightly coiled, and may have only one or two or may have many coils, and they may be flexible or stiff; but still rods, spheres, and spirals comprise all types.

In size there is some variation, though not very great. All are extremely minute, and never visible to the naked eye. The spheres vary from 0.25 u to 1.5 u (0.000012 to 0.00006 inches). The rods may be no more than 0.3 u in diameter, or may be as wide as 1.5 u to 2.5 u, and in length vary all the way from a length scarcely longer than their diameter to long threads. About the same may be said of the spiral forms. They are decidedly the smallest living organisms which our microscopes have revealed.

In their method of growth we find one of the most characteristic features. They universally have the power of multiplication by simple division or fission. Each individual elongates and then divides in the middle into two similar halves, each of which then repeats the process. This method of multiplication by simple division is the distinguishing mark which separates the bacteria from the yeasts, the latter plants multiplying by a process known as budding. Fig. 2 shows these two methods of multiplication.

While all bacteria thus multiply by division, certain differences in the details produce rather striking differences in the results. Considering first the spherical forms, we find that some species divide, as described, into two, which separate at once, and each of which in turn divides in the opposite direction, called Micrococcus, (Fig. 3). Other species divide only in one direction. Frequently they do not separate after dividing, but remain attached. Each, however, again elongates and divides again, but all still remain attached. There are thus formed long chains of spheres like strings of beads, called Streptococci (Fig. 4). Other species divide first in one direction, then at right angles to the first division, and a third division follows at right angles to the plane of the first two, thus producing solid groups of fours, eights, or sixteens (Fig 5), called Sarcina. Each different species of bacteria is uniform in its method of division, and these differences are therefore indications of differences in species, or, according to our present method of classification, the different methods of division represent different genera. All bacteria producing Streptococcus chains form a single genus Streptococcus, and all which divide in three division planes form another genus, Sarcina, etc.

The rod-shaped bacteria also differ somewhat, but to a less extent. They almost always divide in a plane at right angles to their longest dimension. But here again we find some species separating immediately after division, and thus always appearing as short rods (Fig. 6), while others remain attached after division and form long chains. Sometimes they appear to continue to increase in length without showing any signs of division, and in this way long threads are formed (Fig. 7). These threads are, however, potentially at least, long chains of short rods, and under proper conditions they will break up into such short rods, as shown in Fig. 7a. Occasionally a rod species may divide lengthwise, but this is rare. Exactly the same may be said of the spiral forms. Here, too, we find short rods and long chains, or long spiral filaments in which can be seen no division into shorter elements, but which, under certain conditions, break up into short sections.