Culture media and Chaos theory--predicting the unpredictable.

Undefined culture media have played a major role in diagnostic microbiology for 100 years. Chaos theory explains why increased knowledge of microbial systems has failed to predict defined nutritional requirements for the isolation of organisms. A brief description of Chaos theory is given and three microbiological areas of unpredictability are discussed: uncertain identity of isolates, unknown stress damage, unexplored variation of individual colony populations. Probably all living biological systems are non-linear, complex interactions and operate within Chaos theory.