Question of the day. Where do we draw the line in terms of privacy when sampling sewer systems? I have had some major concerns about microbiome studies using sewer system samples in the past. And of course people are trying to use sewer system studies to look at all sorts of other epidemiology related data. …
Microbes and buildings The Microbiome of Green Design: Sustainable building practices may have unforeseen consequences for microbial communities and human health – Carolyn Beans – BioScience ($40 for 1 day) Just as our bodies teem with microbial life, so, too, do the homes, offices, schools, and other indoor spaces where we spend the majority of our …
Microbes and the built environment sensu stricto This short review in Trends in Microbiology is open access, very relevant for this blog, and received quite some press. Review: Buildings, Beneficial Microbes, and Health – Jordan Peccia, Sarah E. Kwan – Trends in Microbiology (OA) Bacteria and fungi in buildings exert an influence on the human …
A recent paper by Newton et al compares the microbial community composition in human stool to that of the sewage sludge that it inevitably ends up in. And surprise! The communities looked really similar. Sewage species recaptured most of the human stool species, and was essentially a medley of various gut microbes. The really cool part is how the …
Back in May we posted about a Gizmodo article entitled “Concrete-Dissolving Bacteria Are Destroying Our Nation’s Sewers”. This article highlighted Sloan-funded work by Mark Hernandez and others that describes some of the biochemistry and microbiology behind concrete corrosion in sewers. A (fee-required) paper describing that work has just come out, with a press release focused …