Yet another Legionella outbreak, this time in a retirement home in Ohio that has killed 6 people and sickened a couple dozen others. I feel like the rate of new stories about Legionella outbreaks (at least in the US) has been rising a lot the last couple of years. I found some data from the …
As a yoga devotee and general fitness fanatic, I often use communal exercise equipment when I’m traveling or unexpectedly drop into a class after work. I’ve been wondering lately about scientific studies specifically looking at surfaces such as yoga mats, but after a quick literature search it seems that knowledge is thin in this area. …
Here’s a story that combines two of my favorite topics these days, microbes and space. In this case students from Japan are building a special satellite to house and photograph slime mold growth (Dictyostelium discoideum). I’m not sure exactly what they’ll learn from this, but it sounds cool! Pictures and data will be publicly available …
Interesting article from a couple days ago talking about the procedures used to assess salmonella contamination in poultry processing plants and some of the issues therein. Not recommended reading if you’re having chicken for dinner anytime soon. h/t to Paula for sending us the link to this article.
Well only a mere couple of months after the 2nd Annual Sloan Conference on the Microbiology of the Built Environment Conference ended I’ve finally gotten all of the talks up onto YouTube. There’s a few missing (opted out or technical problems) but most of them are there. It was a great and informative series of …
Quick post here (crossposted from my Tree of Life blog). Our Project MERCCURI got some press coverage relating to an event July 20th with the Arizona Cardinals: Gilbert, Tempe participate in national microbe-swabbing project – East Valley Tribune: Gilbert. From the article: “The event – held at the Arizona Cardinals’ training facility on July 20 – …
Quick post to call attention to this meeting report: The Hospital Microbiome Project: Meeting Report for the 2nd Hospital Microbiome Project, Chicago, USA, January 15th, 2013 | Gilbert | Standards in Genomic Sciences. From the paper “This report details the outcome of the 2nd Hospital Microbiome Project workshop held on January 15th at the University of …
Puffballs are a type of fungus that is aptly named. You can ‘puff’ their ball-shaped fruiting bodies, and so many spores come out (a large one can contain 7 million), they make a visible cloud. This ostentatious and satisfying practice makes puffballs a popular choice for novice mushroom hunters tasked with bringing in specimens for …
Just found out about this really cool project: Pathomap | Mapping New York’s Unseen Residents. From the project page “Pathomap is a research project by Weill Cornell Medical College to study the microbiotic population and genetic dynamics in urban areas in order to detect and respond to escalated microbial dangers.” Basically, Chris Mason, along with collaborators, …
Checking out this new paper from Rachel Adams, Anthony Amend, John Taylor and Thomas Bruns: A Unique Signal Distorts the Perception of Species Richness and Composition in High-Throughput Sequencing Surveys of Microbial Communities: a Case Study of Fungi in Indoor Dust – Online First – Springer. It is open access so anyone out there can get …