Biochemistry today has made spectacular progress in unraveling the mysteries of animate nature. This progress has allowed us to gain deeper insight into the principles of vital activity and has to a very significant extent stimulated the development of applied disciplines, especially medicine. Microbial metabolism is the main contribution for the bodily decay of all organisms after death. Many eukaryotic microorganisms are heterotrophic by predation or parasitism, properties also found in some bacteria such as Bdellovibrio (an intracellular parasite of other bacteria, causing death of its victims) and Myxobacteria such as Myxococcus (predators of other bacteria which are killed and lysed by cooperating swarms of many single cells of Myxobacteria). Most pathogenic bacteria can be viewed as heterotrophic parasites of humans or the other eukaryotic species they affect. Growth can be defined as an orderly increase of all chemical compounds in a cell/population resulting in an increase in mass of the cell/population, i.e. the increase in mass is always accompanied by a comparable increase in all other measurable properties of the cell/population during growth. All the topics are narrated in an interesting and systematic manner, making it an indispensable book that provides a clear understanding of the complexity of this book.
