Explain the phenomenon known as diauxic growth. Hypothesize why this type of regulation might be ...

 Consider Escherichia coli as an example: when Escherichia coli is exposed simultaneously to both glucose and lactose, it will preferentially use glucose before lactose. Diauxic growth therefore explains how cells control gene expression, often as operons and regulons, to achieve the fastest growth rate. If a cell were to not have this mechanism, it might be outcompeted in the environment by other faster growing and replicating cells. Lacking a global catabolite regulation system might be advantageous for cells occurring in a mixed population where competition for a single substrate could provide poor growth yields.