Digital ACT Science Practice Question #1778

If a bactericidal antibiotic that inhibits cell wall synthesis is added at Hour 0, the optical density at Hour 4 would most likely be: Experiment Context (Bacterial Population Growth Phases): Microbiologists inoculated a nutrient broth with Escherichia coli at 37°C and sampled optical density at 600 nm (OD600, proportional to bacterial cell count) over 10 hours: Table 8: - Hour 0: OD600 = 0.05 (Lag phase) - Hour 1: OD600 = 0.06 (Lag phase) - Hour 2: OD600 = 0.18 (Log phase) - Hour 3: OD600 = 0.52 (Log phase) - Hour 4: OD600 = 1.48 (Log phase) - Hour 6: OD600 = 2.20 (Stationary phase) - Hour 8: OD600 = 2.22 (Stationary phase) - Hour 10: OD600 = 1.65 (Death phase)