This episode: Programming bacteria to sense and keep genomic records of environmental inputs!
(15.9 MB, 17.4 minutes)
Dear Vincent, Dickson and Daniel,
I like your idea of a TWIP coffee mug prize (or maybe a mug discount).
In this second case study you presented, the present symptoms are pretty vague, but his history is interesting. Also since with ... Read More
Cleveland Clinic researchers have, for the first time, linked trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO) – a gut metabolite formed during the digestion of egg-, red meat- or dairy-derived nutrients choline and carnitine – to chronic kidney disease.
TMAO has been linked to heart disease already, with blood... Read More
Living deep underground ain't easy. In addition to hellish temperatures and pressures, there's not a lot to eat. Which is why oil reservoirs are the microbes’ cornucopia in this hidden realm.
Microbes feast on many oil reservoirs, but it has been unclear how the micro-organisms got to those ... Read More
It’s a firmly established fact straight from Biology 101: Traits such as eye color and height are passed from one generation to the next through the parents’ DNA.
But now, a new study in mice by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has shown that the DNA of ba... Read More
Bacteria may not have brains, but they do have memories, at least when it comes to viruses that attack them. Many bacteria have a molecular immune system which allows these microbes to capture and retain pieces of viral DNA that they have encountered in the past, in order to recognize and destro... Read More
A paper just published in nature:
reports an effective antibiot... Read More
More than 600 years after the bubonic plague wiped out about half of Europe, scientists still don’t fully understand how bacteria that cause the disease travel from the site of a fleabite to the lymph nodes, where the rampage truly begins.
Researchers who’ve been studying the bacteria say the... Read More
By the dawn of the 19th century, tuberculosis had killed one in seven of all people that had ever lived. Doctors believed it was hereditary, but had begun to observe that fresh air and outdoor living could sometimes change the course of the illness. Physician and TB patient Edward Trudeau was co... Read More
We’re in the midst of an outbreak of debate, people arguing the merits of vaccinations. Its symptoms include feverish rhetoric and noxious op-eds. In an attempt to stem the spread of unhealthy attitudes toward science and misinformation about vaccines, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation sponsor... Read More
A trial of a GSK/NIH candidate Ebola vaccine at Oxford University suggests the vaccine has an acceptable safety profile and is able to generate an immune response.
An international team led by Uppsala University scientists has succeeded, for the first time, in depicting intact live bacteria with an X-ray laser. This technique, now described in the journal Nature Communications, can give researchers a clearer understanding of the complex world of cells.
... Read More
An experimental medication that targets a protein in Ebola virus called VP24 protected 75% of a group of monkeys that were studied from Ebola virus infection, according to new research conducted by the U.S. Army, in collaboration with Sarepta Therapeutics, Inc. The study was published this week ... Read More
Lyme disease, transmitted by a bite from a tick infected by the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria, had long been considered easy to treat, usually requiring a single doctor's visit and a few weeks of antibiotics for most people.
But new research from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public H... Read More
A Montana State University graduate student who wants to reduce the number of people dying from lung infections has discovered a molecule that's critical for immunity.
Caffrey researches the early immune response against Aspergillus fumigatus, a common mold that can be found in soil or compos... Read More
Fecal microbiota transplantation can be effective for recurrent Clostridium difficile infection, but new-onset obesity could follow transplant of stool from an overweight donor, a new study finds
"Fecal transplant has helped a lot of people who have run out of other options," Dr. Colleen R. K... Read More
New research from the University of Alabama at Birmingham suggests that Fusobacterium necrophorum more often causes severe sore throats in young adults than streptococcus — the cause of the much better known strep throat. The findings, published today in the Annals of Internal Medicine, suggest ... Read More
Dr. Vincent Racaniello is the Higgins Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at the college of Physicians and Surgions of Columbia University. Along with his academic research, he is known for expanding knowledge with great contributions through his virology blog virology.ws, and his wide podc... Read More