Changes in Microbes of the Built Environment in Early Stages of Urbanization

  In our previous 2012 Sloan project “Microbes of the built environment spanning human urbanization” we studied environmental microbes in gradients of transculturation and of urban social stratification at the basin of the Amazon River, from hunter-gatherer villages in Peru, to the modern city of Manaus. The results showed an association between changes in home …

Sloan Microbiology of the Built Environment Data Analysis Workshop (secrets of QIIME, VAMPS and QIITA)

Submitted to me by Rob Knight. Announcement: Sloan Microbiology of the Built Environment Data Analysis Workshop (secrets of QIIME, VAMPS and QIITA) April 4-5, 2016 University of California, San Diego Application Deadline — February 15, 2016 — mitchellsogin@gmail.com This workshop, staffed by the developers of QIIME, VAMPS and QIITA, invite participants from the Microbiology of …

Interesting possible model for microbiomes and space travel: bees

Just got done looking at this paper which I found by searching Google Scholar for “indoor bacteria”.  PLOS ONE: 16S rRNA Amplicon Sequencing Demonstrates that Indoor-Reared Bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) Harbor a Core Subset of Bacteria Normally Associated with the Wild Host A MiSeq multiplexed 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing of the gut microbiota of wild and indoor-reared …

Important paper: Intrinsic challenges in ancient microbiome reconstruction using 16S rRNA gene amplification

To date, characterization of ancient oral (dental calculus) and gut (coprolite) microbiota has been primarily accomplished through a metataxonomic approach involving targeted amplification of one or more variable regions in the 16S rRNA gene. For anyone interested in rRNA studies of microbial communities, ancient microbiomes, or analysis of samples with small amounts of DNA this …

Emily Anthes writes about Wildlife of Your Homes microbiome studies in the New Yorker 

“Every unswept corner of a home tells its own story”. By Bouyoun Kim from the New Yorker Website. Source: What the Dust in Your House Says About You – The New Yorker Nice article in the New Yorker by Emily Anthes about the Home Microbiome studies from the Wildlife of Your Homes project. It has some …

Indoor Microbiome Meta-analysis

A new paper from Adams et al does a meta-analysis of indoor microbiome data to further characterize the microbial interactions within the indoor built environment. They used sequence data from four studies that covered South Korean homes, Colorado restroom surfaces, Colorado kitchen surfaces, and North Carolina homes, and found that communities were most similar between the type …

California Limits Antimicrobials in Livestock

I’m very excited about this news story. California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill requiring antimicrobial drugs to be available only through veterinary prescription and not simply for growth promotion. It’s a small step in limiting widespread resistance from overuse of antibiotics, but hopefully it serves as an example to other states and nations. China …