Legionella sequencing in tap water and clinical isolates from Flint, MI

So this was a very interesting paper to be involved in.  On the one hand all our lab really did was to facilitate some genome sequencing and help with the assemblies, validation of those assemblies, and some genomics work.   Standard fare for the lab.  But… these were over 100 Legionella pneumophila isolates collected from either …

Water, microbes and space 

Some cool new projects funded by NASA including one on microbes in water in space being run by Jiseon Yang at ASU. NASA has awarded 15 grants for new space biology research designed to help the agency achieve its goals under the Artemis lunar exploration program. Teams of investigators will use state-of-the-art Source: NASA Artemis …

Space Station conditions are selective but do not alter microbial characteristics relevant to human health

Human space exploration beyond Earth and Moon is a declared goal of NASA, ESA, Roscosmos and other space-faring agencies, with human Mars mission envisioned in the near future. One of the major challenges of the mission is protecting the human crew from illness and infection caused by harmful biological contaminants. To evaluate these challenges in …

The report from Kaunas: ISES-ISIAQ 2019

Last week, the International Societies of Exposure Science and Indoor Air Quality had their joint meeting in Kaunas, Lithuania. The meeting featured a lot of great research on topics ranging from the thermal comfort of clothes to exposure to heavy metals from e-cigarettes and everything in between. While we can’t summarize the whole meeting here, …

Chemistry in Indoor Environments Symposium Sept. 19 in DC w/ Livestream 

This looks like it should be good.   American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Symposium on the Chemistry in Indoor Environments Sponsored by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation #aaascie #indoorchem September 19, 2019 AAAS Headquarters 1200 New York Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20005 Chemistry in Indoor Environments Symposium | American Association for the …

Legionella Report Release Webinar: August 14th, 11AM EDT

  Register Here Please join the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine on August 14th from 11:00am-12:30pm EDT for the release of the report, Management of Legionella in Water Systems. The report examines what is known about Legionella occurrence in water systems, and makes recommendations for managing bacterial growth in these environments in order …

Integration of Biology and Chemistry for Indoor Environmental Quality at ISES-ISIAQ 2019

By Pudelek (Marcin Szala) – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link The International Societies for Exposure Science and Indoor Air Quality are having a joint meeting August 18-22, 2019 in Kaunas, Lithuania. Grantees from both the Microbiology of the Built Environment and Chemistry of Indoor Environments programs will feature in several sessions. In addition, there …

Research England Funded Hub for Biotechnology in the Built environment

Got this note to post from Dr Darren L. Smith from the HBBE to post here. ———————— The Hub for Biotechnology in the Built Environment (HBBE) (www.bbe.ac.uk) is a £8M initiative between Northumbria and Newcastle Universities funded by Research England’s Extending Excellence in England (E3) scheme. HBBE will develop biotechnologies to create a new generation …

New wastewater anammox project

So our lab appears to be digging deeper and deeper into the world of wastewater treatment, especially the process of removing ammonia from wastewater in the final steps.  I’ve posted before about our sample collection from a pilot wastewater treatment facility.   We’ve been sequencing those samples like crazy… we’ve thrown Nanopore, Illumina, and PacBio data …