What are antibiotics? Detailed answer

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What are antibiotics? Detailed answer

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What are antibiotics?

Antibiotics are medicines that are used to prevent and treat infectious diseases. "Anti" means "against" and "biotic" means "life". Antibiotics only affect certain life forms, the bacteria that cause disease. But antibiotics themselves are created on the basis of living organisms - bacteria, various compounds, larger plants.

Antibiotic production began in 1928 when Sir Alexander Flemming discovered penicillin. His discovery was investigated by other scientists, which led to the search for new antibiotics. Soil samples around the world have been studied in search of microorganisms that would be able to produce substances that are applicable in the fight against infectious bacteria. As a result, today we have a lot of antibiotics, including penicillin, streptomycin, aeromycin, terramycin. Some antibiotics, in addition to affecting pathogenic bacteria, can be toxic to the body.

How antibiotics stop the growth of bacteria is not yet entirely clear. Antibiotics are thought to prevent bacteria from getting the nutrients they need to grow.

Each infection has its own antibiotic. Some patients have a particular sensitivity (allergy) to certain antibiotics. They can cause hives, asthma, or more serious illnesses.

Sometimes antibiotic treatment takes a long period of time, and sometimes they are used prophylactically. With the advent of antibiotics, infections have become less likely to lead to death. Infectious diseases no longer pose a threat to human life.

Author: Likum A.

Random interesting fact from the Great Encyclopedia:

Are lizards poisonous?

There are few animals in the world that would have such a frightening appearance as some lizards! And yet, of over 2500 lizard species, only two are truly venomous. This is a gila-tooth living in the deserts of America, and a beaded lizard from Mexico. Lizards are close relatives of snakes and, like snakes, they are reptiles with scaly skin.

However, unlike snakes, their long body can be divided into three parts: head, torso and tail. Most species have four legs. With such a variety of lizard species, we can naturally meet many exceptions. For example, some lizards do not have legs at all and are absolutely similar to snakes. They have a fair amount of strength, which helps them defend themselves from enemies. They can drop their tail! This often saves them when some enemy stops to grab them by the tail. Subsequently, the lizard grows a new tail!

Although most lizards are born from eggs, there are species that are born alive. Most lizards feed on insects, but some species feed on birds and small animals. Most often, lizards are found in the tropics, but in general they live all over the world, except for the Arctic. Wherever lizards live, they perfectly adapt to the environment. For example, those lizards that live in grass or trees are brightly colored, while those that live in the desert are dark gray or brown to blend in with the sand.

The chameleon, which also belongs to the lizards, can even change its color depending on the environment. Lizards have a wide variety of sizes. One of the Central American lizard species is no more than 8 centimeters in length.

There is another species called "lizard", and its representatives reach 2 meters in length. In India, there are lizards, which are called "dragons", the length of which can reach up to 3 meters. They are a truly awesome sight! These dragons can easily kill a fairly large animal with a single blow of the tail. Lizards love to bask in the sun. Therefore, those of them that live in places with a cool climate simply fall asleep for the winter, hiding somewhere from the cold.

Test your knowledge! Did you know...

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Superhardness state obtained under experimental conditions 04.03.2017

When matter is cooled to absolute zero, interesting phenomena arise, such as superhardness, that is, when a solid body with the properties of a superfluid liquid is obtained. And now scientists have obtained this state for the first time in an experimental form.

Superhardness is one example of such a paradoxical state. In superhardness, the atoms are organized into a crystal lattice, and at the same time they behave like a superfluid when the particles move without any friction. So far, superhardness has been only a theoretical possibility.

A group of researchers from the Swiss Institute of Quantum Electronics has successfully reproduced the state of superhardness in reality.

The scientists injected a small amount of rubidium gas into a vacuum chamber and cooled it down to a temperature where the atoms condense into a state known as a Bose-Einstein condensate, i.e. to the quantum superfluid state.

The condensate was placed in a device with two intersecting optical resonance chambers, each of which consists of two opposite mirrors. After that, the condensate was illuminated with laser light, which is scattered in two chambers. The combination of two light fields in resonant chambers causes the atoms of the condensate to take on a crystal structure, while the condensate retains its superfluid properties, which is impossible in a normal solid state.

Thus, the state of superhardness was reproduced in the laboratory for the first time.

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