• Question: how fast on average does bacteria reproduce

    Asked by to Jane on 18 Mar 2014. This question was also asked by .
    • Photo: Jane Charlesworth

      Jane Charlesworth answered on 18 Mar 2014:

      Different kinds of bacteria take different times to reproduce. Tuberculosis bacteria take a day to reproduce, while E. coli (ones that cause food poisoning) can reproduce in under 20 minutes. Also bacteria from the same species can reproduce more or less quickly depending on how much food is around–it takes a lot of energy to make a new cell.

      Still, they reproduce very quickly compared with humans or any animal. Here’s a video I found showing bacterial reproduction speeded up: http://www.cellsalive.com/ecoli.htm

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