Tesla Motors showed off some tests of their amusingly-named “Bioweapon Defense Mode” on their blog earlier this week. While the demo is raising some skeptical eyebrows among actual biodefense experts, you don’t need crazy movie-plot scenarios to imagine the utility of a more serious approach to indoor air quality in vehicles — air quality in …
On April 11 there was a meeting in Washington DC that was part of an effort from a new study being conducted by the National Academies of Science, Medicine, and Engineering on “Microbiomes of the Built Environment”. Videos and slides from the meeting have now been posted. I have compiled them below. In addition, I …
One afternoon while making my way through another DNA extraction, I was eavesdropping over the lab benches, per usual, trying to keep my mind occupied. I overheard my project manager and another undergraduate discussing an unusual project. “Do you want to contact the Sacramento authorities to get clearance to swab the light rail, because talking …
Introduction In 2013-2014, a metagenomics project called “Pathomap” collected 1,457 swab samples from the surfaces of all active subway stations throughout New York City (NYC), as well as samples from the Gowanus Canal and several parks. Each sample was sequenced to an average depth of 3.6 million reads (paired-end 125 nucleotides), generating a city-wide metagenomic …
In November, 2012, Curtis Huttenhower began work (with funding from the Sloan Foundation) to examine the transmission of human-associated microbes by public transportation surfaces. An article on “Big Data” in the current issue of Harvard Magazine includes a description of Huttenhower’s work in the lead article “Why “Big Data” Is a Big Deal.” After very …