Independent Science Research (ISR) classes recently tested the presence of bacteria at various locations within the school building. Although it was not possible to determine the exact species of bacteria found, the students discovered some types that can be potentially harmful.

        This testing, under the direction of Denise Wingfield, was prompted simply by the course curriculum – not by the recent outbreak of sickness in the school. “It’s something we do every year. We do a unit on collecting and identifying bacteria,” Wingfield said.

        The process that the students undergo to collect and grow the bacteria is fairly short. According to Wingfield, “You collect the bacteria with swabs that look like Q-tips, but are sterile. Then you deposit...the bacteria on agar, bacteria food, in Petri dishes. You incubate them, and if anything is going to grow, by 48 hours it generally shows up.”

        According to MedicineNet, bacteria are single-celled organisms that can be beneficial or harmful, but are predominantly neither. “I tell the kids every year that they have to get out of the mindset that all bacteria are nasty,” said Wingfield.

        The test sites where the students swabbed for bacteria were chosen somewhat randomly. “We sat down as a class and brainstormed the most touched places in the school and what we thought were the grossest. Then we divided them out based on who wanted what,” said senior Gabby Ubilla.

        Ubilla tested the stair rail by the cafeteria because “people touch that and then go eat.” The majority of the bacteria she found were Diplococcus, which is rarely dangerous according to Britannica Encyclopedia, and mostly Gram Positive. “There was a lot of bacteria in my plate.”

        Once the bacteria have been cultured, the students use Gram stains to divide what they found into the two main types of bacteria, Gram Negative and Gram Positive. Wingfield commented that these two categories are like boy and girl among humans. Although the basics, like gender, are known, something like historical descent cannot be determined.

        However, the color of the stain does show the fundamental nature of the bacterium. “[Bacteria] are identified using a very basic microbiological stain, called a Gram stain...Gram Positive will have a blue or purplish color and Gram Negative will have a red or pinkish color,” Wingfield said.

        Senior Roy Xiao tested teacher Peter Lenotti’s locker and the button that students have to push to be admitted into the school after classes begin. “There was some spore-forming bacteria on the button. And on Lenotti’s locker, there was some fishy-looking orange stuff,” Xiao said.

        Another spore-forming bacteria was found in the stair wells. “We found some really nice pink bacteria that I’ve never seen here before. It looked like a spore-forming bacteria in the stairwells,” Wingfield said.

        When senior Rachel Tacci observed the bacteria she had gathered from the gray part of the hand sanitizer in a computer lab, she discovered Streptococcus. According the MedicineNet, Streptococcus causes “strep throat, strep pneumonia, scarlet fever, rheumatic fever,” as well as a kidney disease and a skin disease.

        In reaction to what she observed, Tacci said that “the school’s dirty and people need to wash their hands. Some of the colonies [of bacteria] wouldn’t even come off the agar.”

        When the ISR classes grow the bacteria that they gathered, they are culturing them. A culture is “bacterial growth on or in an artificial medium,” according to MedicineNet, and the bacteria need to be kept warm in an incubator to increase chances of duplication. However, without agar, which the classes make themselves, the bacteria would all die.

        In order to make agar, Wingfield said, “It comes in a powdered form. You make it just like Jell-O. You heat it and then pour it into the Petri dishes to cool.”