Experiment and artistic work that investigates the reactions of E. coli bacteria to various concentrations of antibiotic ampicillin. During 72 hours I observed how fast bacteria are able to adapt to new conditions. In this case, acquiring antibiotic resistance. Different colonies reacted in different ways some of them thrived whereas some diminished.

Inspiration to do this work was PETRI PLATTER, a petri dish more than a meter long which also visualized gaining the antibiotic resistance in E. coli bacteria. Bacteria placed on the outer edges had to adapt to higher and higher levels of antibiotics as they moved toward the center of the plate. Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yybsSqcB7mE

The main difference between those two experiments was that “My little mutants” were done on 4 different smaller Petri dishes with the same concentration of antibiotics.

The question was how different E. coli colonies will behave.

I also designed specific concentrations of antibiotic, which required some tests.

The project makes tangible processes that occur and are potentially dangerous to us in the future. If bacteria become immune to antibiotics we use to treat infections we are in a big danger.