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Differential Staining & Specialized Media
Identification of Unknown Bacteria Laboratory Exercise
Lab #3: Differential Staining & Specialized Media
This is the main page for the Differential Staining & Specialized Bacterial Growth Media Laboratory Topic of an 8-week introductory college microbiology class. This is part of a series of three labs, in the Virtual Microbiology Classroom, on identifying unknown bacteria, also see Lab #2 and Lab #4.
SCIENCE PHOTOS
SPO VIRTUAL CLASSROOMS
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ADDITIONAL LABORATORY REQUIRED READINGS
Microscopy:
Bacterial Stains:
- Gram Stain Procedure: Differential Stain for Gram+ & Gram- Bacteria Identification
- Acid-fast Ziehl Neelsen Stain for Identifying Mycobacteria & Nocardia Bacteria
- Endospore Stain Procedure: Differentiating Endospores from Vegetative Bacterial Cells
- Differential Staining & Bacterial Controls: Gram, Acid-fast & Endospore Stains
Bacterial Media & Culture:
- Differential & Selective Bacterial Growth Media: MacConkey's, Mannitol Salt & Blood Agar
- Cellular Metabolism: What Is Fermentation?
How to Prepare a Bacterial Smear for Gram Staining
How to Prepare a Bacterial Smear for Acid-fast
(Ziehl-Neelsen) Staining
How to Prepare a Bacterial Smear for Endospore Staining
How to Do a Gram Stain
How to Do an Acid-fast
Ziehl-Neelsen Stain
How to Do an Endospore Stain
Tutorial on Compound Light Microscope Parts & Operation
MORE DIFFERENTIAL STAINING & SPECIALIZED MEDIA LINKS
- Streak Plate Procedure Animation: with narration from Sinauer Associates.
- Streak Plate Interactive Animation: from MSU. Test your skill to see if you can do a virtual streak plate procedure that produces isolated colonies.
- Gram Stain Bite Sized Tutorial: This is an extremely useful tutorial that shows, step-by-step, the Gram-staining procedure and the appearance of Gram+ and Gram- bacterial cells.
- Acid-fast Stain Animated Tutorial: Very educational video of the staining procedure.
- Endospore Stain Procedure: Instructions, illustration and table indicating color of cells at each step.
- Bacterial Endospore Formation animation and quiz from McGraw-Hill
DIFFERENTIAL STAINING & SPECIALIZED MEDIA LAB VIDEOS
DIFFERENTIAL STAINING & SPECIALIZED MEDIA LAB IMAGES
The images linked here directly relate to the lab exercise and are designed to help you review and study that lab material while outside of lab.
- Microbiology General Images (see examples of API-20E)
- Bacterial Staining: Gram, Acid-fast & Endospore Stain Images
- Bacterial Growth Media: MacConkey's & Mannitol Salt Images
How to Interpret MacConkey's Agar (MAC) Specialized
Bacterial Growth Medium
How to Interpret Mannitol Salt Agar (MSA) Specialized
Bacterial Growth Medium
SCIENCE VIDEOS
NOTE: Students must review all material in categories highlighted with red titles PRIOR TO ATTENDING LAB in order to be prepared to participate.
DIFFERENTIAL STAINING & SPECIALIZED MEDIA
LAB DOCUMENTS
The Lab Exercise Instructions are the main resource required for students to understand and complete this exercise. They provide a thorough explanation of the lab topic, as well as detailed directions on how to complete the exercise. The Lab Report Assignment is the homework that students complete and turn in.
- Lab #3: Differential Staining & Specialized Media Lab Exercise INSTRUCTIONS
- Lab #3: Differential Stains & Specialized Media Lab Report ASSIGNMENT
Additional Lab Documents:
The ID of Unknown Bacteria Lab materials include:
- Lab Exercise & Report documents
- Laboratory PowerPoints
- Laboratory required readings
- Videos & images related to the lab
- Additional links that support the lab material
DIFFERENTIAL STAINING & SPECIALIZED MEDIA LAB POWERPOINTS
The lab PowerPoints used to introduce the material in the related Lab Exercise Instructions & Report Assignment.
- Lab #3: Differential Staining of Bacteria [PowerPoint Show or PDF Printout]
- Lab #3: Specialized Bacterial Growth Media [PowerPoint Show or PDF Printout]
Printing: The best way for students to print out the PowerPoint Show is to download the PDF version. Select Print, and, when the Print screen comes up, go to the Print Handling options. Under Page Scaling, select "Multiple pages per sheet", Under Pages per sheet, select "2". That uses up less paper, placing two slides on each page.
A mixed slide of acid fast Mycobacteria (hot pink) and non-acid fast Staphylococcus (purple).
Diagram on white board of bacterial controls used for Gram, Acid-fast-and Endospore differential staining of bacterial smears. Positive control on left, negative control on right, unknown bacteria in center.
Page last updated: 2/2016
You have free access to a large collection of materials used in a college-level introductory microbiology course. The Virtual Microbiology Classroom provides a wide range of free educational resources including PowerPoint Lectures, Study Guides, Review Questions and Practice Test Questions.
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