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The Weight of a Cell
A single E. coli bacterium weighs about one picogram, 60 million times less than a grain of sand. But how do we know?
Back in 1953, for example, two biologists from Southern Illinois University (supported, in part, with funding from the Anheuser-Busch brewery) invented one of the first methods to determine the weight of an individual yeast cell. And then — because they already knew the fluid’s viscosity and density — they were able to use Stokes’ law to calculate the weight of an individual cell: 79 picograms, on average: a value remarkably close to estimates made as recently as 2022. After a cell passes through the vibrating beam and its mass is recorded, researchers reverse the flow of liquid and send it back through the channel in the opposite direction.
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