• Question: How many bacteria are there approximately in an organism?

    Asked by ItsssAlexandraaa to Ben, Francis, Max on 15 Mar 2018.
    • Photo: Francis Man

      Francis Man answered on 15 Mar 2018:

      We don’t know exactly but it seems we there could be somewhere between 3x and 10x more bacterial cells than human cells in the human body. Weird isn’t it?
      We’ve known for a long time that there are lots of bacteria inside the body (mostly in the guts but also in the nose and mouth), but we’re only slowly beginning to understand which bacteria are there, and how useful they are.
      It’s a fascinating field, I’d love to know more about it.

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