I am curious - Are the bacteria really "evolving" at each subsequent boundary? In the article/video, they specifically mention "mutations". That says to me, that the bacteria are literally experiencing mutations within their nucleotide pairs, that results in them becoming more resistant to the drug?
Couldn't it also be that among the initial population, there existed 1 (or more) very very strong bacteria? At each boundary, the weak ones are dying off (hence the pause in growth) while the strong ones continue to reproduce. Since they're strong, but few, you witness a lag in overall growth of the population which the article is saying is the "evolving" process, when really it's more of a filter process. Filtering the strong, from the weak, by progressively stronger antibiotic strands.
I guess ultimately I'm just wondering what they specifically mean by "evolve" and "mutation".
Even if the mutation was part of the original soup of bacteria, the process in the video still shows evolution. Either at time=0 or some point in the future, a strain of bacteria was more fit to survive and produce viable offspring than the others that died off in the presence of the antibiotic doses.
Couldn't it also be that among the initial population, there existed 1 (or more) very very strong bacteria? At each boundary, the weak ones are dying off (hence the pause in growth) while the strong ones continue to reproduce. Since they're strong, but few, you witness a lag in overall growth of the population which the article is saying is the "evolving" process, when really it's more of a filter process. Filtering the strong, from the weak, by progressively stronger antibiotic strands.
I guess ultimately I'm just wondering what they specifically mean by "evolve" and "mutation".