pGLO Lab

1.

Obtain your team plates.  Observe your set of  “+pGLO” plates under room light and with UV light.  Record numbers of colonies and color of colonies. Fill in the table below. Plate Number of Colonies Color of Colonies Under Room Light Color of Colonies Under UV Light -pGLO LB 0 Tan Purple (the color of UV light) +pGLO LB/amp About 58 Tan Purple (the color of UV light) +pGLO LB/amp/ara About 99 Tan Green

2.	What two new traits do your transformed bacteria have?
	The transformed bacteria glows green under the UV light and the bacteria is now resistant to the antibiotic ampicillin.
3.	Estimate how many bacteria were in the 100 uL of bacteria that you spread on each plate. Explain your logic.
	An E. Coli cell is about 2 micrometers cubed and 1 micrometer is equal to (1e+9), which is 1,000,000,000. Since we spread 100 microliters of bacteria onto each plate, there were 100 times 1,000,000,000 bacteria on the plate, equalling a total of 100,000,000,000 bacteria that we spread on each plate.
4.	What is the role of arabinose in the plates?
	The role of the arabinose was to help the bacteria glow and to actually activate the pGLO plasmid. As was stated in the vodcast, the protein GFP is supposed to make the bacteria glow, but in order for the GFP to be activated, the arabinose is used to trigger that protein, making the bacteria glow..
5.	List and briefly explain three current uses for GFP (green fluorescent protein) in research or applied science.
	GFP can be used to serve as a marker protein, where when it attaches to and mark another protein, the scientists are then able to see the presence of that protein. GFP can also be used to study bacteria more easily. GFP can also be used to study diseases like HIV and track the spreading of those diseases.
6.	Give an example of another application of genetic engineering. Genetic engineering has many applications in the medical field. One of the earliest applications of genetic engineering in pharmaceuticals was gene splicing to mass produce insulin in the body. -pGLO LB without UV light -pGLO LB with UV light +pGLO LB/amp without UV light +pGLO LB/amp with UV light +pGLO LB/amp/ara without UV light +pGLO LB/amp/ara with UV light