The manipulative friend: bacterial hijacking of plant symbiosis signalling
The post this week is part of a blog-swap with Sarah Shailes (@SarahShailes) of the Plant Scientist blog. You can read my post on plant defences against bacteria over at her blog.
Communication between kingdoms: the micro-organisms that live on the human body
From the point of view of a micro-organism, the human body is a prime piece of real estate. For those bacteria and fungi that can avoid or fight off the immune systems, a human provides a whole range of moist, nutrient-filled little spaces in which to live.
Missing Nitrogen May Be Vanishing in the Tubes of Giant Bacteria
Off the coast of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula lies a dark, still, deep place. It is called the Soledad Basin, and in it lies a garden of bacteria so large you can see them with your own eyes.
The 4 Billion-Year-Old Story of Obesity
We've never had an environment so rife with cheap caloric energy. The population-level rise in obesity is a natural response to this situation.
Sophisticated Sticker Spots Salmonella
An invention by physicists could make testing for bacteria as simple as slapping a sticker on food and waving a handheld scanner. Wayt Gibbs reports
Selfmade: Making Cheese on the Microbial Superhighway
Cheese is a fascinating model for studying the intersection of human and microbial cultures. My project with Sissel Tolaas explores these connections through the process of making cheese using microbes sampled from the human body.
Guest post: Bricks of knowledge
While I’m getting used to my new arrival the iGEM Team from Copenhagen have kindly provided a great guest post about their work over the summer.
Feces-Filled Pill Stops Gut Infection
The treatment has been found to halt recurrences of Clostridium difficile bacteria, but a commercial pill is still far off
No Shots for the Octopus, Its Immune System Doesn’t Remember
Flu season is almost upon us, so millions of us are already rolling up our sleeves to get the annual shot. This jab is formulated to introduce our immune system to this year’s circulating strains of the virus so that it will remember how to make the specialized antibodies to fend it off the viral [...]
Hospital-Based Infections Could Be Moving to Doctor’s Offices
When patients check into a hospital, they expect doctors there to fix what ails them, but one in 20 patients seeking care at hospitals contract a health care–based infection.
New View Into Our Guts Reveals Microbiome’s Murky Links To Health
What is living in your gut? It might depend less on your diet, exercise habits, weight and sex than you think, according to new findings. Our health is tied to trillions of organisms that live in and on us.
Pig-Manure Fertilizer Linked to Human MRSA Infections
Living near livestock farms and manure-treated fields are found to be associated with higher rates of antibiotic-resistant infection