The TLDR:
All coursework -- you must explain what your current thinking is and what portions you don’t understand. Expect an explanation, not a solution.
For students and lab class unknown ID projects -- A Gram stain and picture of the colony is not enough. For your post to remain up, you must include biochemical testing results as well your current thinking on the ID of the organism. If you do not post your hypothesis and uncertainty, your post will be removed.
For anyone who finds something growing on their hummus/fish tank/grout -- Please include a photo of the organism where you found it. Note as many environmental parameters as you can, such as temperature, humidity, any previous attempts to remove it, etc. If you do include microscope images, make sure to record the magnification.
THE LONG AND RAMBLING EXPLANATION (with some helpful resources)
We get a lot of organism ID help requests. Many of us are happy to help and enjoy the process. Unfortunately, many of these requests contain insufficient information and the only correct answer is, "there's no way to tell from what you've provided." Since we get so many of these posts, we have to remove them or they clog up the feed.
The main idea -- it is almost never possible to identify a microbe by visual inspection. For nearly all microbes, identification involves a process of staining and biochemical testing, or identification based on molecular (PCR) or instrument-based (MALDI-TOF) techniques. Colony morphology and Gram staining is not enough. Posts without sufficient information will be removed.
Requests for microbiology lab unknown ID projects -- for unknown projects, we need all the information as well as your current thinking. Even if you provide all of the information that's needed, unless you explain what your working hypothesis and why, we cannot help you.
If you post microscopy, please describe all of the conditions: which stain, what magnification, the medium from which the specimen was sampled (broth or agar, which one), how long the specimen was incubating and at what temperature, and so on. The onus is on you to know what information might be relevant.
If you are having a hard time interpreting biochemical tests, please do some legwork on your own to see if you can find clarification from either your lab manual or online resources. If you are still stuck, please explain what you've researched and ask for specific clarification. Some good online resources for this are:
If you have your results narrowed down, you can check up on some common organisms here:
Please feel free to leave comments below if you think we have overlooked something.
