Is there an alternative method for getting a count of the bacterial population in an assay? What else can be used other than an optical density sensor?
Note: It has to be a non-invasive measurement and equally or more precise.
Chinmayee,
Off the top of my head, and with zero evidence (yet) that they may work:
a) Viscosity (dense populations, surely, would raise the viscosity of the medium).
This can be measured through, say, the decay timescale of ultrasound pulses. Or simple mechanical methods.
b) Relative permittivity
Not the DC value, but the shape of the relative permittivity curve with respect to frequency may reveal the presence of strongly non-polar ensembles of molecules.
(still thinking)
(the next day)
Mmm.
I guess that it also depends on the culture medium. A petri dish is a very different environment to a liquid culture. Is the problem one of time? Counting CFUs with a microscope is tedious - that can be automated - but if the culture is a large vessel of liquid, then I'd be inclined to give viscomechical methods a, ah, 'spin'.
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