Well, this is very very interesting: Request for Information (RFI): Ecology Meets Genomics – Federal Business Opportunities: Opportunities. IARPA – the equivalent of DARPA for the intelligence agencies – is getting into microbial biogeography (for forensic purposes). They are seeking comments on the general topic. From the call: We hypothesize that by correlating the genetic information …
I’m proud to announce that the sample collection for the building science component of Project MERCCURI is complete! In early May, Koichi Wakata from JAXA (Japan’s space exploration agency) collected swabs swabs of surfaces aboard the International Space Station. Back in June last year, Jenna, Wendy and I went to the Johnson Space Center in …
I’m working on a manuscript describing the different and particular challenges scientists in various disciplines face when incorporating citizen science into their research. So, I thought I would go looking for other articles about it, and found one with the promising title A new dawn for citizen science by Jonathan Silvertown. I’m holed up in …
Well, the news just does not get any better / different for cruise ships and microbes. Despite major efforts (or so they claim) by the cruise industry – people keep spreading Norovirus and other such illnesses aboard cruise ships. For example, see: Illnesses Aboard California Cruise Ship Nearly Double. Not sure just what is going …
While searching for news about microbes in the built environment I stumbled across these fascinating photographs (electron micrographs) of symbiotic termite gut microbes. Taken with a scanning electron microscope by Kevin J. Carpenter a biologist/microscopist/photographer (and fellow Davis alum!), they just finished an exhibit at the Beaty Biodiversity Museum in January, after being displayed in …
ESPN reports that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers management has arranged to have one of their facilities “treated” due to presence of MRSA: Tampa Bay Buccaneers treat facility to prevent MRSA outbreak – ESPN. Seems like this would be a good case study for a team of microbial ecologists with experience in sporting facilities. Calling Project MERCCURI. …
In my last two posts I described the process of developing the microbial growth experiment we will be running aboard the International Space Station. We’ve tackled growth assays on 96-well plates in zero gravity, at least in theory. How well will this actually work on aboard the space station? To find out, Jenna, Wendy and …
Im a graduate student in Jonathan Eisen’s lab and had a chance to attend this year’s installment of the ASM general meeting was in Denver last month. Among the hustle and bustle of a slew of talks at the ASM-2013, I got a chance to attend the Citizen Microbiology of Built Environment session sponsored by Sloan …
Well, I did not know there was a shoe fairy out there but apparently there is. See this post Philly Shoe Fairy: Shoe Science! where the Philly Shoe Fairy discusses participating in our Project MERCURRI. This type of response is exactly why we love the idea of partnering with Darlene Cavalier, the Science Cheerleader, because she has …
At microBEnet we’ve had a long standing interest in citizen science in microbiology (and are finally doing some ourselves). If you’re interested in the idea of citizen science, check out this webinar on how to recruit citizens scientists.