Microbial Genomics: a new journal you’d definitely invite to your next party

Hello! I’m Jenn Gardy, a new MicroBEnet contributor! I hold a Canada Research Chair in Public Health Genomics at UBC, and work out of the BC Centre Disease Control, using genomics as a tool to reconstruct and understand infectious disease outbreaks. I also enjoy cat butt genomics. Today I’m writing with a different hat on, …

Call for Papers! Microbiome special issue on the Microbiology of the Built Environment

Just a quick plug: Jack Gilbert and I are guest-editing a special issue in Microbiome dedicated to Microbiology of the Built Environment. We are now accepting original research, methods, and software article submissions to be considered for the special issue (planned for publication in late 2015). We are looking specifically for work that involves multiple aspects of the …

Open courses and course materials on microbiology of the built environment

One activity we have been hoping to do more of here at microBEnet is to catalyze the development and sharing and evaluation of course materials (preferably free and open) for teaching about microbiology of the built environment.  I confess this is just not my area of expertise so I am going to be writing a …

Sloan Foundation funds an Indoor Microbiome Workshop in Finland

The Alfred P. Sloan foundation has approved a grant to organize a workshop on indoor microbiome in Finland in Fall 2015.  The workshop is designed for a scientific exchange including a workshop and researcher exchanges that will bridge the Sloan grantees in US and Canada with the research groups in Finland and neighboring countries.  The workshop organizing committee, …

Open Source Building Science Sensors

This is just a quick post to introduce some early work products resulting from a really exciting project my team has been working on: the Open Source Building Science Sensors (OSBSS) Project (funded by the Sloan Foundation). The goal of OSBSS is to to design and develop a network of inexpensive, open source devices based on …

An excellent example for any funding agency: Leukemia & Lymphoma Research goes full #openaccess

Great news here: Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research pledges to make its research open to all.  Matt Kaiser  – the Head of Research has written this up in a blog post.  It is worth reading the whole article.  I note – I really hope that the Sloan Foundation can take this approach in the “microbiology of the …

Lessons Learned from Building an Interdisciplinary Scientific Community in the Online Sphere

The Microbiology of the Built Environment Network (http://microBE.net – this website) has made it into the community page at PLoS Biology! Our article has been in the works for some time, and we’re now pleased to announce its official publication: Bik HM, Coil DA, Eisen JA (2014) microBEnet: Lessons Learned from Building an Interdisciplinary Scientific Community …

Visualizing millions of DNA sequences – in your web browser!

I’ve been remotely following the Sloan MBE meeting discussions (happening in Boulder, CO this week), and yesterday there was a lot of Twitter discussion focused on data visualization tools. How do we make sense of the millions of DNA sequences we generate from microbial ecology projects in the Built Environment? I thought I’d use this opportunity to highlight …