Dynamics of glucose-lactose diauxic growth in E. coli

We present a mathematical model of glucose-lactose diauxic growth in Escherichia coli including both the postive and negative regulation mechanisms of the lactose operon as well as the inducer exclusion. To validate this model, we first calculated the time evolution of beta-galactosidase for only the lactose nutrient and compared the numerical results with experimental data. Second, we compared the calculated cell biomass of the glucose-lactose diauxic growth with the experimental optical density of the diauxic growth for a particular E. coli MG 1655. For both cases, the numerical calculations from this model are in good agreement with these two experiments' data. The diauxic growth pattern of a wild type E. coli was also investigated.