Every organism must find in its environment all of the substances required for energy generation and cellular biosynthesis. The chemicals and elements of this environment that are utilized for bacterial growth are referred to as nutrients or nutritional requirements. Many bacteria can be grown the laboratory in culture media which are designed to provide all the essential nutrients in solution for bacterial growth. Bacteria that are symbionts or obligate intracellular parasites of other cells, usually eucaryotic cells, are (not unexpectedly) difficult to grow outside of their natural host cells. Whether the microbe is a mutualist or parasite, the host cell must ultimately provide the nutritional requirements of its resident.