Results presentation and discussion - Essay Example

However, the difference in the distance travelled by the 3 phages shows that type IV PILI is needed for infection. PAO1 travelled the greatest distance close to 2.5 cm while CHA (27641) travelled the least distance. In order to determine if the results (distances moved) obtained in the laboratory correlates or relate to what other researchers have found in the past, one sample T-Test was used. The output results below (table 2) show that the p value is less than 0.05. This means that there is a statistically significant difference between the value obtained in the previous researches and the one got in this study.

The spot assay was done to establish whether one phage is more infective than another. This is in terms of a broader host range. Basing on the table 2 below, it is observed that Phage 2 and 3 infect closely the same strains of P. aeruginosa. The strains infected by the two are PAO1, PAK, AA2, AA43, AMT0060.1, CHA (27641), IST27N, and AMT0060.3. Phage 4 is different in the strains it infects which could be caused by a difference in its progeny as compared to phages 1 & 2 therefore giving it a disadvantage.

The presence of a spot in the spot assay showed that the phage can infect the P. aeruginosastrain by horizontal gene transfer. Therefore, from the results, phage 2 and 3 had a higher infective power. Strains that include IST27MUC NN2 AND AMT0023-30 are resistant to all the three phages. This is mainly due to their genome which makes them resistant to the infection. The source of the strain is also significant in determining its properties and whether it will be infected. The strains from children are more susceptible to infection compared to that from adults (Burns et al. 2000). According to figure 1 above, it is observed that phage3 has a greater infective power, followed by phage2 and phage 4 has the least infective power.

It is also seen that Phage 2 has 53%, phage 3 has 73 % and phage 4 has 33%. Plaque assays