The Identification of Unknown Bacteria

A major activity of most college level introductory microbiology courses is the identification of one or more unknown bacterial species. The ways suggested in many lab manuals for identifying bacteria are often unorganized and difficult to follow. In addition, the huge volume of information often required to make a diagnosis may overwhelm beginning microbiology students who are largely incapable of weighing the importance of many of the tests in trying to decide how to best proceed with the identification. Microbiology manuals too often overlook the fact that identification is an orderly process of moving from general characteristics to more specific differences between closely related organisms