MicrobeWorld

Soil is the most species-rich microbial ecosystem in the world. From this incredible diversity, plants specifically choose certain species, give them access to the root and so host a unique, carefully selected bacterial community from which they then benefit in a variety of ways. To achieve this... Read More

Here's your vocabulary word for the week: zoonosis. It describes an infection that is transmitted between species. For example, the disease that the husband and wife team of Bill Wasik and Monica Murphy have written about in their new book, Rabid: A Cultural History of the World's Most Diabolica... Read More

La Crosse virus has become the most common insect-borne viral disease in children, greatly surpassing the better-publicized West Nile virus. Also this week: cost management joins the medical curriculum.

La Crosse Virus Outpaces West Nile

West Nile virus infections may get all the headlines... Read More

MicrobeWorld is partnering with the Society for General Microbiology (UK) to live stream two events from their Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Joseph... Read More

In a quest to make safer and more effective vaccines, scientists at the Biodesign InstituteÒ at Arizona State University have turned to a promising field called DNA nanotechnology to make an entirely new class of synthetic vaccines.

In a study published in the journal Nano Letters, Biodesign ... Read More

Fall is on the horizon, bringing with it freshly-sharpened pencils, vibrantly-colored leaves, and of course - the annual influenza season. Join us at ASM Headquarters on Tuesday, October 9, 2012, from 6 - 8 PM ET ( Read More

Scientists of the Antwerp Institute of Tropical Medicine have breathed new life into a forgotten technique and so succeeded in detecting resistant tuberculosis in circumstances where so far this was hardly feasible. Tuberculosis bacilli that have become resistant against our major antibiotics ar... Read More

When you've collapsed in a hotel bed at the end of a day of vacationing, the last thing you want to worry about is whether a previous guest left germs behind. But germs are invisible to the naked eye, so how do hotel housekeepers — who have an average of 30 minutes to clean a room — make sure th... Read More

Huw Taylor, Professor of Microbial Ecology at the University of Brighton, presented his inaugural lecture on Thursday 21 June 2012 entitled: People, Places and Pathogens.

Professor Taylor, who did his undergraduate degree in microbiology, said that the science of medical microbiology has del... Read More

Microbes used to treat human waste might also generate enough electricity to power whole sewage plants, scientists hope. Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Stanley Ma... Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier

Vincent and Dickson answer listener email... Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Michael Schmidt, and Read More

I’ll confess, I never quite thought about what happens when you get millions of a single kind of bacteria all together in one place and take a nice long sniff. I did not think it would ever be pleasant. I was wrong.

This level of olfactory whimsy, then, was totally new to me: Pseudomonas aeru... Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Michael Schmidt, and ... Read More

In 2009 researchers from the UT Health Science Center San Antonio and other institutions crack the genetic code of Schistosoma mansoni, a flatworm that can live up to 10 years on average in humans. The parasite is endemic in many tropical areas of the world.

Nature (16-Jul-2009) Read More

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello,  Read More

Did you know that the Denver Museum of Nature & Science has 1.4 million artifacts and specimen that are used every day in scientific studies and educational programs?

That the area between Denver, Boulder and Fort Collins is often called the "Napa Valley of Beer," where some of the best micr... Read More

The veined wing of the clanger cicada kills bacteria solely through its physical structure — one of the first natural surfaces found to do so. An international team of biophysicists has now come up with a detailed model of how this defence works on the nanoscale. The results are published in the... Read More