#COVID19 Journal club “Susceptibility of ferrets, cats, dogs, and other domesticated animals to SARS–coronavirus 2”

Not a pre-print this time but a (presumably) peer-reviewed article about the susceptibility of domesticated animals to SARS-CoV-2.  The authors looked at  dogs, cats, ferrets, pigs, ducks, and chickens.  Basically the virus can infect ferrets and cats pretty well and that with cats, they can potentially get the virus from other cats.  Not clear yet …

Job posting: Postdoc in Microbiology at the USDA in Davis, CA

Job posting below: Postdoctoral Research Associate Western Human Nutrition Research Center Davis, California (Research Microbiologist) Salary Range of $67,574 to $80,993 Announcement Open: December 1, 2019 through January 31, 2020 The USDA, Agricultural Research Service, Western Human Nutrition Research Center in Davis, California, is seeking a POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCH ASSOCIATE, (Research Microbiologist) for a TWO YEAR …

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, …

Backyard lab sequencing party: MinION “fieldwork”

So we recently had two problems with a common solution: #1, we hadn’t had a lab social function in awhile #2, we wanted to try using the MinION sequencer in a “field” setting, but weren’t quite ready to try it without electricity on hand. The obvious solution, have the entire lab over to my house …

Journal Club: Ecology of sleeping: the microbial and arthropod associates of chimpanzee beds

Interesting new article from Rob Dunn’s lab about the microbial and arthopod communities associated with chimpanzee beds.  The article itself is clearly pitched within a microbiology of the built environment context… highlighting the fact that we haven’t really looked much a non-human constructed artificial environments.  Pretty cool stuff! The outpouring of press on the topic …