An antibiotic does it in
Is it Mount St. Helens finally erupting after weeks of ominous activity? A booby-trapped pineapple in the act of blowing up? In fact the remarkable photograph released by the microbiology laboratories of the Bronx-Lebanon Hospital Center in New York City shows a bacterium literally exploding after getting a dose of antibiotic.
Shown magnified 150,000 times, the staphylococcus bacterium was exposed to a low-level dose of antibiotic. As a result, the wall of the one-celled bug began eroding. That process poses a great danger to the bacterium, which has internal pressures ranging from 25 to 30 atmospheres. Strained by...
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