THE ENERGETICS OF BACTERIAL-GROWTH - A REASSESSMENT

The growth yield of microbial cultures can be used to estimate the eff iciency of energy generation during a fermentation or respiration. in the past, the assessment of this efficiency in organisms carrying out a respiration has been the subject of many heated debates. This has pa rtly been caused by the complexity of microbial respiratory chains. St rains of Escherichia coli specifically modified in their respiratory c hain have been used recently to re-evaluate the energetic efficiency o f the bacterial respiration using chemostat cultures. The different st rains indeed show different growth efficiencies. The physiological sig nificance of energetically less-efficient branches of the respiratory chain is discussed.