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Microbiology - Cell population count


turtletoes

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Hello,

I'm a bit frustrated by one section of my microbiology reading for this week. I just can't wrap my head around the variables in the equation for cell population count and prediction of cell numbers in x amount of time.

I'm reading https://courses.lumenlearning.com/microbiology/chapter/how-microbes-grow/ .

One of the sample questions asks, "With a doubling time of 30 minutes and a starting population size of 1 × 105 cells, how many cells will be present after 2 hours, assuming no cell death?"

The formula is 

Nn=N02n

Nn is the number of cells at any generation n, N0 is the initial number of cells, and n is the number of generations.

Would someone please translate this formula in a different way so that I can calculate it on my own?

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2 hours ago, turtletoes said:

Would someone please translate this formula in a different way so that I can calculate it on my own?

Does this help: Nn= N0 x 2n  . It's the same as the above formula but I have included the multiplication sign, which is excluded by convention but it is implied.

First find the value of n, which is the number of generations possible in 2 hours.

Edited by StringJunky
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