Actually there is a possibility. Since we can introduce some GFP or similar proteins by recombinant plasmids that shine at a given wavelength, you can do the same with the microbes of yours, and introduce them a plasmid to produce a protein, that gives a wavelength, which is NOT present in the non-plasmid introduced colony. This way, you can observe the linear growth of absorbance with number of microbes in the medium.
That would be a short summary. Please inform so if you want more information.
Sincerely.
Transmission spectrophotometer measures the extinction - it means the scattering plus absorption. So you should be able to measure the increase of light scattering due to microbial growth, even if they do not have distinct spectral absorption bands. I recoll that there exist commercial devices for similar purposes based on this principle. Using Mie theory you can even estimate the size of microbs based on how the scattering changes with wavelength.
PS: please, put the more appropriate topic of question: it has more to do with microbiology, applied optics, uv-vis spectroscopy etc.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Physical Sciences
- Materials Science
- Materials Chemistry
- Polymer Chemistry