Answer to Question #249783 in Microbiology for Lole

Question

1. Why is fungal growth rate slower than bacterial growth rate? (5 marks)

2. List 4 ways in which fungi are useful to humans. (4 marks)

3. List 4 ways in which fungi are harmful to humans. (4 marks)

4. Why is it difficult/takes a long time to treat fungal infections in humans? (3 marks)

5. What are some distinctive features of fungi that can be used for its morphological characterization and identification? (4 marks)

Answer 1

1. Fungal growth and replication is ordinarily more slow, and regularly more complex than bacteria. Unicellular yeast, generally multiply through budding, which is an asexual process of reprouction but are capable of sexual multiplication.
   

-Fungi are an important source of food.Some mushrooms such as Morchella and Agaricus are edible.

-Yeast,a unicellular fungus,is important in bakeries as it is used in the making of bread.

-Yeast also produces vitamin B

-Fungi,like bacteria,are also good decomposers.They decompose dead organic matter and return the nutrients back into the soil.

-Penicillin an important antibiotic is obtained from a fungus called Pencillium notatum.

3. Fungi are harmful as they cause disease

• Rusts and smuts on farm crops and orchards
• Athletes foot
• Oral thrush
• Yeast infections

4. Fungal infections prove to be difficult to deal with because fungi are eukaryotes unlike bacteria which are prokaryotes. Antibiotics target prokaryotic cells however, compounds that destroy fungi harm the eukaryotic animal host too.

5Fungi are multicellular and display two distinct morphological stages; the reproductive and vegetative The vegetative involves a tangle of slender thread-like structures called hyphae (singular, hypha ), whereas the reproductive stage can be more conspicuous. The mass of hyphae is a mycelium