When the laboratory instructor said “take the test organism and stab into the butt”, most of the students were stunned! It was that practical of Microbiology, which taught many students the importance of jargon.
In our medical school, we use an integrated approach in teaching-learning. In a single problem-based question, students may be answering questions related to ‘introduction to clinical science’, ‘community health’, ‘anatomy’, ‘physiology’, ‘microbiology’, and other basic science subjects. A few years back, I was checking the answer sheet of first-year students of our undergraduate medical school (like pre-med students in western countries), reading that answer, I couldn’t hold my laughter. Later, I realized that all my colleagues were staring at me in shock!
The question and the answer was as follows:
Qs “What are four types of media used in Microbiology?”
Answer was: Papers, TV, Billboard, and Internet
The above examples clearly illustrate that scientific terminology used in microbiology or microbial jargon may invite miscommunication. Jargon refers to technical vocabulary that is specific to a particular profession or field. Many times, the technical term might be completely unfamiliar to a non-practitioner outside of the field or may have a different meaning depending on its context. When we know which word falls outside of a lay audience’s vocabulary, we may use an appropriate word or simple word to make our communication with them clear, concise, and understandable.
Here, I have listed the “Microbial Jargon Worksheet” published by American Society for Microbiology. I hope this will help.
Table of Contents
Measurements/Quantification
| Word | Public Meaning | Microbial Meaning |
| Colony | A group of individuals or things with common characteristics or interests situated in close association | Millions of individual microbes growing together as spherical dots on agar plates and visible by the naked eye. |
| Isolate | An individual socially withdrawn or removed from society | An individual, population, strain, or culture obtained by or resulting from selection or separation |
| Ladder | A structure for climbing up or down that consists essentially of two long sidepieces joined at intervals by crosspieces on which one may step. | Tool used to mark the molecular weight of unknown samples in nucleic acid electrophoresis |
| Sequence | A continuous or connected series | The order of nucleotides within a nucleic acid |
Methods/Tools
| Word | Public Meaning | Microbial Meaning |
| Bath | A washing or soaking (as in water or steam)of all or part of the body | Container filled with liquid (usually water) that is heated or cooled to a controlled temperature, providing a gentle method of maintaining sample temperature |
| Culture | Acquaintance with and taste in fine arts, humanities, and broad aspects of science | The act of growing microbes in the lab for research |
| Fish/FISH | An aquatic animal | Fluorescent (or fluorescence) in situ hybridization |
| Gram | A metric unit of mass equal to 1/1000 kilogram | Frequently-used stain that distinguishes different types of bacteria based on their cell wall properties |
| Hood | A flexible covering for the head and neck, or a protective covering for the head and face | Structure that provides an aseptic work area while allowing the containment of infectious splashes or aerosols generated by many microbiological procedures |
| Loop | A curving or doubling of a line so as to form a closed or partly open curve within itself through which another line can be passed or into which a hook may be hooked | A tool, usually made of platinum or nichrome wire, in which the tip forms a small loop that is used to smear, streak, or take an inoculum from, a culture of microorganisms |
| Media | Those who work in fields such as newspapers, radio, or television and report on news | Water and nutrients that support microbial growth |
| PDA | Public Display of Affection | Peptone-dextrose agar or photodiode array |
| Plate | A shallow, usually circular vessel from which food is eaten or served | A circular flat dish with a lid that is used for growing bacteria on a bed of nutrient jelly |
| Streak | To run naked through a public place | Method used to isolate pure microbial cultures by dragging an innoculated instrument along the surface of an agar dish |
| Tip(s) | A piece of advice or expert or authoritative information | Device that attaches to a pipettor, used to transfer liquid between vessels using suction and pressure |
| Well | A hole made in the earth to reach a natural deposit (as of water, oil, or gas) | Indentation arranged in a regular matrix pattern on a plastic plate, used to grow and/ or analyze samples in parallel |
Organism
| Word | Public Meaning | Microbial Meaning |
| Be serious/B. cereus | A way to say “stop joking” or tell someone to stop acting weird | Toxin-producing gram-positive bacteria that causes intestinal illness |
| Bugs* | Any members of the order Hemiptera, OR any of various small arthropods (such as a beetle or spider) resembling these insects | A colloquial term for microbes |
| Mold | The frame on or around which an object is constructed | Fungi which grow as semi-microscopic organisms, and whose mycelium tends to form a loose meshwork rather than a dense tissue |
| Staff/staph | Individuals chiefly responsible for the internal operations of an institution or business | Short for the bacterial genus “Staphylococcus” which is commonly found on human skin |
Processes/Mechanisms
| Word | Public Meaning | Microbial Meaning |
| Clone | One that appears to be a copy of an original form | Produce many copies of a gene by repeated cycles of replication |
| Conjugation | Schematic arrangement of the inflectional forms of a verb, typically based on tense and person | A form of genetic exchange between bacteria without multiplying or reproducing |
| Expression | Facial aspect or vocal intonation as indicative of feeling | Production of an observable phenotype by a gene, usually by directing synthesis of a protein |
Structures/Traits
| Word | Public Meaning | Microbial Meaning |
| Aerobic | A system of physical conditioning involving exercises strenuously performed so as to cause marked temporary increase in respiration and heart rate | Requiring oxygen for survival |
| Cell | A single room (as in a convent or prison) usually for one person | The smallest unit that can live on its own and that makes up all living organisms and the tissues of the body |
| Envelope | A flat, usually paper container (as for a letter) | External viral membrane derived from infected host cell |
| Lawn | Ground that is covered with grass and is kept mowed | A uniform and uninterrupted layer of bacterial growth, in which individual colonies cannot be observed |
| Resistant | Exerting force in opposition | Having developed the ability to employ defense strategies to resist the effects of antibiotics and antimicrobials |
References and further readings