Differences Between Bacteria and Virus

 Differences Between Bacteria and Virus 

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S.N.	Character	Bacteria	Virus
1	Cell type	Prokaryotic cells	Acellular
2	Number of cells	Single-celled	No cell
3	Size	Larger than viruses (0.3-2 μ)	Minute (0.02-0.3 μ)
4	Microscopy	Visible under Light Microscope.	Visible only under an Electron Microscope.
5	Shape	Common bacterial cell shapes include cocci (spherical), bacilli (rod-shaped), spiral, and vibrio (comma-shaped).	Viruses typically have spherical (polyhedral), rod-shaped, or helically shaped capsids while some viruses, such as bacteriophages, have complex shapes.
6	Cellular Machinery	Possesses a cellular machinery	Lack of cellular machinery
7	Type of organism	Mostly intercellular organisms (i.e. they live in-between cells); some intracellular.	Intracellular organisms (they infiltrate the host cell and live inside the cell).
8	Structure	Organelles and genetic material within a cell wall	Genetic material within a capsid, some have an envelope membrane.
9	Cell wall	Cell wall made of peptidoglycan and lipopolysaccharide.	No cell wall. Protein coat presents instead.
10	Cellular membrane	Cell membranes present. No sterol except in Mycoplasma cells which have cholesterol.	Some are enveloped, but no membrane function.
11	Genome	DNA and RNA 1 chromosome No histones	DNA or RNA 1 nucleocapsid except in segmented or diploid viruses
12	Nucleic acid	DNA and RNA floating freely in the cytoplasm.	DNA or RNA is enclosed inside a coat of protein.
13	mRNA	Mono- and poly-cistronic mRNA	Some have poly-cistronic mRNA and post-translational cleavage.
14	Cell organelles	Presence of non-membrane bound cell organelles.	Absent. Uses host organelles; obligate intracellular parasites
15	Ribosomes	70s ribosomes (30s+50s)	No ribosomes
16	Living attributes	Living organisms.	Between living and non-living things.
17	Replication	Binary fission (asexual). DNA replicates cells continuously.	It invades a host cell and takes over the cell causing it to make copies of the viral DNA/RNA. Destroys the host cell releasing new viruses.
18	The need for host cell	Able to reproduce by itself.	Need a living cell to reproduce
19	Other forms	In some spore-forming bacteria, sporulating forms can be seen.	Besides viruses, two other acellular forms exist Viroids and Prions.
20	Cells Infected	Animal, Plant, Fungi	Animal, Plant, Protozoa, Fungi, Bacteria, Archaea
21	Infection	Localized	Systemic
22	Induction of Fever	A bacterial illness notoriously causes a fever	A viral infection may or may not cause a fever.
23	Duration of illness	A bacterial illness commonly will last longer than 10 days.	Most viral illnesses last 2 to 10 days.
24	Diseases/Infections	Food poisoning, gastritis, and ulcers, meningitis, pneumonia, etc	AIDS, common cold, influenza, chickenpox, etc
25	Susceptibility to Antibiotics	Most bacteria are susceptible to antibiotics.	The virus does not respond to antibiotics.
26	Treatment	Antibiotics	Antiviral drugs
27	Beneficial use	Some bacteria are beneficial (as normal flora, probiotics, fermenters, etc.)	Viruses are not beneficial. However, a particular virus may be able to destroy brain tumors. Viruses can be useful in genetic engineering.
28	Examples	E.coli, Salmonella spp., Listeria spp., Mycobacteria spp., Staphylococcus spp., Bacillus anthracis, etc.	HIV, Hepatitis A virus, Rhino Virus, Ebola virus, etc.