Determining if life exists or ever existed beyond Earth is one of the most interesting scientific questions. Reports on numerous habitable planets have increased the speculations about potential extra-terrestrial life. However, these theoretically life-supporting planets are far beyond human’s reach – except Mars. In order to explore if there ever was life on Mars, the …
Epidemiological and other studies have shown that, on average, having a dog is correlated to some possible health benefits (e.g., see this). And some studies have further suggested that this might be connected to “the microbiome” in that having a dog might change the microbiome of one’s surroundings and that this in turn might contribute …
Just a quick post here, an interesting BE story from NPR called “The Taming Of The Brew: How Sour Beer Is Driving A Microbial Gold Rush“. I don’t even like beer but I thought this was a fascinating story.
Human exploration of planet Mars has a long history with number of robotic missions surveying the Martian surface and environment, including the Viking program (1975), the Mars Exploration Rover Mission (2003), the Phoenix lander (2008), and the Mars Science Laboratory (2012). For the future human space exploration, crewed Mars mission is considered as one of …
Not for the faint of heart. But this is an important article and worth a look: Hunting a Killer: Sex, Drugs and the Return of Syphilis – The New York Times In the article, Jan Hoffman discussed the “return of symphilis” – that is, how syphilis has been undergoing an increase in the number of outbreaks …
The Aerobiota of the Mauna Loa Observatory (MLO), Hawai’i project will fully characterize the fungal and bacterial communities captured over the last decade by air filters at the MLO on the island of Hawai’i, one of the most remote locations on earth. It might seem odd to call a weather station in a remote …
This is a cross-posting of a Press Release from the American Society for Microbiology. A team of Swiss chemists and microbiologists have shown that a species of anaerobic bacterium can inhibit corrosion on archeological artifacts made of iron. The research is published March 10 in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, a journal of the American Society …
Amidst the November/December holiday chaos, myself and co-authors were proud to witness the publication of a neat new paper focused on ATM keypads in New York City. Yes, just like all other surfaces in the Built Environment, those ATM keypads are harboring lots of microbes and bits of orphaned DNA! This ATM keypad study was work that …
A few weeks ago I attended a course entitled “Strategies and Techniques for Analyzing Microbial Population Structure” at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, along with a number of other students, postdocs and faculty engaged in the study of the microbiology of the built environment (as well as the oceans, humans, animals, plants). This excellent …
The Flint Water Crisis garnered national and international media coverage of elevated levels of lead in the water delivered to consumers’ taps. When the city of Flint began using the Flint River as its drinking water source without the addition of a corrosion inhibitor beginning in April 2014, the corrosive new water began to leach …