Microbial paintings or agar art

Agar agar is widely recognized as a herbal food additive that is used as a confectionery thickener. But in the scientific community, this substance has another unusual use. The fact is that agar-agar is a nutrient medium that is ideal for growing microorganisms. This property of it provoked the formation of a separate direction in art, called "agaric art". It consists in creating a variety of ornaments, patterns and whole paintings from microbes.

Today, this type of creativity is considered the prerogative of scientists, since pictures of microorganisms can form only in laboratory conditions. For this, a number of conditions must be met. To obtain the desired effect, agar-agar is combined with water. Then it is poured into special vessels - Petri dishes, which are used for various experiments, as well as for storing pharmacological preparations. When agar agar becomes jelly-like, bacteria colonies are sown on its surface. All microorganisms have their own color and structure. After a while, interesting patterns appear on the jelly, forming a single image.



Agar art has become popular recently, but it cannot be called innovative either. For the first time, the possibility of growing bacteria in jelly was demonstrated by Alexander Fleming. Making paintings out of microbes was his hobby. By the way, perhaps it was just such a hobby that provoked the discovery of the life-saving penicillin. The cultivation of microbes turned into a mass art only a century later.

It is worth noting that agar art requires some precautions. The fact is that if it enters the body, the substance can cause a number of diseases.

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