Human Health Introduction
| Site: | Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University Online Learning Portal |
| Course: | Human Health, Disease and Its Management-Basics |
| Book: | Human Health Introduction |
| Printed by: | Guest user |
| Date: | Thursday, 7 May 2026, 5:57 AM |
Description
This Book include Human health introduction , Useful and Harmful Microbes and Check Your Progress.
Note : This is mandatory to complete. After completing, you can manually mark the activity as completed.
After completing this unit, You will be able to :
- explain the useful and harmful microbes
- describe the pathogens and its types
1. Intoduction
Balanced diet is important for maintaining good health. If balanced diet is not taken, people suffer from malnutrition. This is one of the causes for ill-health. But in human beings health is also upset or spoiled due to lack of clean water, clean air, and hygienic food. Besides these, poverty, illiteracy and over population are also the major factors that cause ill-health and diseases. A disease is an abnormal condition that affects the body of an organism. It may be caused by factors originally from an external source, such as infectious diseases or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune diseases. Some diseases also caused by micro- organisms. In this unit you learn some aspects concerning good health, onset of diseases and prevention and cure of the diseases.
The human microbiome plays a vital role in maintaining homeostasis of various organ systems and protecting against infectious agents. It can be subcategorized into local or regional microbiomes throughout the body, such as the gut, oral, skin, lung, and vaginal microbiomes. These manicured microecosystems are highly organized and complex, with each person having their own distinct makeup and distribution of various microorganisms. Though, individual microbiomes are unique, there is still capacity to understand key role players in the community and their potential for adaptation to improve human health in general.
Attribution: ""3.1: Human Health and Disease" by Dylan Parks, LibreTexts platform. is licensed under CC BY 4.0
2. USEFUL AND HARMFUL MICROBES
The harmful microbes are present everywhere. They can survive even in inhospitable conditions. These are in the soil, in the air we breathe, in the food we eat and in the water we use for drinking or bathing. Microbes enter our body through the natural openings of the body such as mouth, nose, eyes, urinary and reproductive passages. These, on entering our body, get multiplied very fast. In a few days a single bacterium can produce millions of it and these in turn infect millions of cells at the site of infection. But virus is reproduced only in the living cells or live tissues of man and animal beings.
Many microbes are even useful to human race and are very important even for existence of life on the earth. Without these micro organisms life on earth would even perish. For example, we are making use of useful bacteria in the preparation of curds, alcohol, bread and cakes. These micro organisms decompose dead plants and animals and sewage into harmless chemicals such as CO2, water etc.
Useful Microbes
i. lactobacillus bacteria are responsible for the curd formation. Yeast which is used commercially for alcohol and wine production. The production is called fermentation. Yeast is also used in baking industries for the preparations of bread and cake.
ii. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria take nitrogen gas from the air (which animals and plants need but cannot use directly in that form) and turn it into nitrogen compounds that plants use as nutrients to build their bodies. Azotobacter and Clostridium are examples of nitrogen fixing bacteria
iii. Saprophytic bacteria help clear the earth of dead organisms by decomposing them. This process also recycles nutrients back into the soil for plants to use to build their bodies at the beginning of the food chain.
iv. Bioremediation is a process that uses of biological organisms to treat and break down hazardous wastes and pollutants into harmless materials. Pseudomonas putida is a soil bacterium that involved in the bioremediation of toluene
Harmful Microbes
i. Some bacteria cause food to spoil and/or may produce toxins that can cause food poison. Two types of food poisoning are Salmonella (common) and Clostridium botulism (a rare but deadly form).
ii. Escherichia coli causes of food borne illness. Infection often leads to bloody diarrhea.
iii. Mycobacterium causes of tuberculosis. First discovered in 1882 by Robert Koch
iv. Streptococcus mutans present in the human oral cavity and is a significant contributor to tooth decay. The microbe was first described by Clarke in 1924.
Source : Science and Technology, Dr BRAOU
3. You have the microbiome you deserve
4. Check Your Progress
Check Your Knowledge. After completing You can "retry" and Otherwise click on "Show Solutions"