Metabolic consumption of microorganisms

Abstract

This review chapter presents a proposed theory that accounts for the metabolic consumption of microorganisms, which is analyzed and compared with experimental data both qualitatively and quantitatively. As distinct from other models that traditionally disregarded the growth and reproduction from the metabolic process, the proposed model links the latter directly to growth and reproduction in microorganism. The major reason for the latter is that the other models caused inconsistencies between the modeling results and experimental data. A major discrepancy was related to the experimentally observed LAG phase in the growth process. Associating the LAG phase with delay processes, as frequently proposed, has been proven incorrect and will be shown as such in this chapter. The present model shows that the origin of the LAG phase is the existence of unstable stationary states resulting from the explicit inclusion of the metabolic consumption process via a resource consumption and utilization term.