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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2013 Oct 1.
Published in final edited form as: Trends Microbiol. 2012 Aug 10;20(10):461–466. doi: 10.1016/j.tim.2012.07.003

Figure 1. Surprises lurk within averaged data sets.

Figure 1

Colors represent cells with low (white), medium (gray) and high (black) levels of the measured parameter. (a) Bulk culture experimental techniques such as Western blots and β-galactosidase assays measure the average of a parameter across an entire population, but equal means may characterize very different populations as indicated by the different shading. (b) Single-cell analysis techniques such as flow cytometry or microscopy generate a more complete picture of the diversity that may be concealed by averaging.