Did you know that bacteria talk to each other?

You all know how a sleeping baby stretches out their hand to find you. Once they do, they move their cute little bum next to you and—thud!—place their tiny feet on you. It’s a baby’s way of starting communication (stretching their hands), perceiving (finding their mum’s neck), and responding (wiggling their butt closer). 

So, communication obviously includes sending out signals, perceiving responses, and reciprocating. We know we do it, we know animals in the jungle do it, and some of us even know that plants do it. Guess what? Even bacteria do it! This concept is called quorum sensing. 

In simple terms, bacteria release chemicals for others to sense, and vice versa. These signals (chemicals) help bacteria perform important tasks, like building a protective layer around their colony—also known as biofilm formation. 

Socializing bacteria (Image from google)

Scientists are racking their brains over this. Do you know why? Because, well, you know how selfish humans can be—we want to see how we can use this knowledge to use them as a shield for our own benefit. The first step is to understand quorum sensing so we can make it useful for us. Antimicrobial resistance, gut dysbiosis, cancer—you name it, and bacteria are involved. By tapping into this new knowledge, we might be able to fight these diseases more effectively.

My sweet baby understood the importance of hardwork

 My toddler is in nursery, and she is playfully taught to write the alphabet and numbers. While the class is fun, all the practice work is given as homework. She has to sit and write on ruled pages with a pencil, which is not very attractive and can be quite tedious for her little hands to endure.

Because she finds it difficult to write without guided dots or dotted letters to trace, she often becomes fussy and takes a long time to complete a full page. Sometimes, she ends up crying, and at other times, she simply gets up and goes off to play. At the same time, she is aware that she cannot go to school with incomplete homework, which makes her even more frustrated.

But yesterday, all her efforts paid off! After practicing certain types of letters—such as curved ones like B, P, R, and U—the students were made to repeat them, but instead of filling an entire page, they only had to write a single line. For example, if she had practiced writing 'B' 28 times on a page, the final practice involved writing B, P, R, and U seven times each to complete the page.

Yesterday, when she did that, there was no fuss, no rush, and no need for guidance. She was so happy while finishing her homework! She even made it fun by adding a roaring sound while writing 'R' and a parrot sound while writing 'P'—it was adorable. I was overjoyed.

Enjoying her homework

I told her how proud I was of her—that her efforts had given her the ability to complete her homework with ease. If she hadn't practiced well or if I had intervened to make the practice easier, she wouldn't be doing it so happily today. And in her eyes, I could see how proud she was of herself.

It truly made my day.