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Name: Amy
Status: Other
Grade:  Other
Location: N/A
Country: United States
Date: January 2008
Question:
Why do bacterium move not how but why? is it just to transfer?


Replies:
Usually, it's to find better conditions for them to live – perhaps it might be for food, for oxygen (or to get away from oxygen), for light, or for nutrients. Bacteria can sense chemical gradients, and move in the direction of greater (or less) of whatever they are seeking. Other bacteria move for reproductive reasons, to avoid toxins, and some bacteria move for reasons we don't yet know.

Hope this helps,
Burr

Bacteria (not bacterium) move in order to encounter new sources of nutrients and to avoid unfavorable conditions like heat, cold, acidity, light, darkness, etc.

Ron Baker, Ph.D.


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