Pour plate technique involves which process?

Pour plate technique involves which process?

• A. A small amount of diluted sample is mixed with melted agar and poured into empty, sterile Petri dishes
• B. A loop is used to streak across solid medium
• C. A spread plate technique
• D. A pipette is used to inoculate

Answer: (A)

Pour plate technique is about counting viable microorganisms by mixing a diluted sample with melted agar and pouring the mixture into sterile Petri dishes. This embeds the cells in the gel as it solidifies, so colonies can form within the agar and on its surface, which helps produce a countable plate when the sample has been properly diluted. The process requires adding the diluted sample to molten agar kept at a temperature that won’t kill the organisms, then allowing it to solidify before incubation. This is different from streak plating, which uses a loop to spread the sample on a surface to isolate colonies, or spread plating, which distributes a liquid inoculum over a pre-poured plate surface; simply inoculating with a pipette does not specify the plating method.

Pour plate technique is about counting viable microorganisms by mixing a diluted sample with melted agar and pouring the mixture into sterile Petri dishes. This embeds the cells in the gel as it solidifies, so colonies can form within the agar and on its surface, which helps produce a countable plate when the sample has been properly diluted. The process requires adding the diluted sample to molten agar kept at a temperature that won’t kill the organisms, then allowing it to solidify before incubation. This is different from streak plating, which uses a loop to spread the sample on a surface to isolate colonies, or spread plating, which distributes a liquid inoculum over a pre-poured plate surface; simply inoculating with a pipette does not specify the plating method.