Let's Go Streaking

Small microbes may not be the most abundant organisms, but they represent the most significant biomass on this planet. Dinosaurs and mammals get all the attention when it comes to naturals sciences, so presenting microorganisms in a colourful way is empowering.

The Beauty of Microbes with original BIOART:

Bacteria are too small to see with the naked eye. They are, however, all around us. One way to reveal these hidden microorganisms is to grow them in an agar-filled petri dish. In recent years, this simple idea has been transformed into an art form: all across the world, people are now using bacteria to create beautiful works of ‘Agar Art’. Using an inoculating wire loop, different species of microorganisms in various colours are carefully painted onto an agar plate. The plate is incubated to encourage the bacteria to grow, in the hope that it will develop into a microbial masterpiece. Using the universal language of art, we bring the invisible to the visible.

Do you ever wonder how to create this? It’s through Streaking:

In microbiology, streaking is a technique used to isolate a pure strain from a single species of microorganism, often bacteria. Streaking is rapid and ideally a simple process of isolation dilution, which involves the dilution of bacteria by systematically streaking them over the exterior of the agar in a Petri dish to obtain isolated colonies which will then grow into the number of cells or isolated colonies.

“Make your work to be in keeping with your purpose “-by Leonardo da Vinci.

Purpose of streaking agar media:

The main reason why we do streaking is to produce isolated colonies of an organism (mostly bacteria) on an agar plate. This is useful when we need to separate organisms in a mixed culture (to purify/isolate particular strain from contaminants) or when we need to study the colony morphology of an organism.

Some of the art pieces by our Bio-fest team’19:

Painting with microbes:

Like other art forms, agar art involves some planning - coming up with the idea, envisioning the composition, choosing the medium, and choosing the colours. But it also consists of a lot of waiting and patience. The microbes are painted onto the agar, invisible to the human eye. They then multiply on the agar to unveil the painted artwork within a couple of days, in most cases.

Is your brain start creating ideas for your art piece? Oh! Wait. What about different colours? These microbes will clear your doubt!

Some microbes produce colour naturally.

Streptomyces, which produce many of our antibiotics, release blue-green pigments in alkali conditions and red pigments in acidic conditions.

The well-known Escherichia coli produce a beige colour.

Microbes of all colours can be found right in our backyards. One agar artist collected soil from their backyard, diluted it, and spread it on the agar plate to see what could grow. After a period of growth, the plate revealed a palette of colours that they could use to create the art.

Bacteria, over the years, have become art tools so much so that there are annual agar art competitions. A few years ago, the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) decided that it was time to let others get a glimpse of the diversity of microbial life, and launched the Agar Art contest. It was a chance for scientists to get creative in their labs and show the world not only their skills at creating patterns and pictures with bacteria, but also to give people a unique look at microbes. Rather than being something invisible and threatening, these microbes have become the paints on scientists’ palettes.

Every invention has its history:

Alexander Fleming (1881-1955), the scientist who discovered penicillin, was one of the early adopters of agar art. However, agar art did not gather steam for decades.

Angelina Hesse (1850-1934), an assistant and illustrator in Koch’s lab in Germany, discovered that an ingredient used in jellies and puddings could be used to create a better growth medium. That ingredient was agar, a gelatinous substance isolated from seaweed. The biochemist Roger Tsien won the 2008 Nobel prize for chemistry for his contributions to the knowledge of green fluorescent protein (GFP). A researcher in his laboratory, Nathan Shaner, made a 2006 microbial artwork using GFP of a San Diego beach scene.

No matter how popular they get, Bacterium will never go viral.