Microgravity: living on the International Space Station

1 Microbes, bacteria and fungi

This week, you will look at microbes, bacteria and fungi. What are they? And are they the same thing?

The term ‘microbes’ describes microorganisms. These exist either as single cells (unicellular) or as a colony of cells (multicellular), as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 A comparison of unicellular and multicellular organisms.
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Using Figure 1, now complete Activity 1.

Activity 1 Unicellular and multicellular organisms

Allow approximately 15 minutes

Choose the correct options to complete the following statements.




You have now looked at bacteria, but what about fungi? The first difference to consider is that fungi are eukaryotes while bacteria are prokaryotes (Figures 2 a and b respectively).

Figure 2 (a) A eukaryotic cell where the scale is 10 micrometres (10 × 10–6 m) and (b) a prokaryotic cell where the scale is 1 micrometre (1.0 × 10–6 m).
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Using Figure 2, now complete Activity 2.

Activity 2 Eukaryotic and prokaryotic cells

Allow approximately 15 minutes

Choose the correct options to complete the following statements.





5. What is the scale of the sketch of a yeast fungus in Figure 3?

(Hint: this scale includes the Greek lower-case letter mu, μ. This means multiply the distance by 0.000001.)

Figure 3 A budding yeast cell-shaped fungus.
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