I’m writing this as a
homage to one of my closest friends on the blogosphere. The every wonderful LabRat has finally ended her fraught relationship with scientific research and is
throwing herself wholeheartedly into science writing. Whilst I am hugely
envious, I wish her all the best and hope she will remember me when she is rich
and famous. Look out for her in future publications.
By way of background;
Lab Rat has always had a fixation with the simpler things in life, by which I
mean bacteria.
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| False colour E. coli, bacterial/prokaryotic cells. |
All living organisms are made up of cells individual living
units which are relatively self-supporting and capable of total
self-replication, although this is complicated by the intricate interactions
between different cells in larger organisms. Whilst larger creatures, like
humans are made up of billions of cells, the vast majority of life on Earth
exists as single celled microorganisms that cannot be observed with the naked
eye.
Cells fall into two main groups, larger and more complex
organisms, plants, animals and fungi are called eukaryotes (that’s us humans
too) and have much more intricate cellular structures. The earliest forms of
life, with the simplest cells are called prokaryotes, which include bacteria.
