Why do we add ampicillin to the bacterial culture How does a

Why do we add ampicillin to the bacterial culture? How does ampicillin work?

Solution

Ampicillin is a beta-lactamase antibiotic, which is used in the bacterial cultures to determine the presence of ampicillin resistant strains.

After gene transformation, the bacteria with selected transformed genes are identified by growing them in a media containing some testing enzymes. For example, to isolate the bacteria transformed with the plasmid carrying the gene coding for beta-lactamase, bacterial cultures are allowed to grow in LB media containing ampicillin. If the bacteria is transformed with the bacterial plasmid containing beta-lactamase gene, it grows in culture media otherwise, it does not grow as its growth is inhibited by ampicillin.