MicrobeWorld

If keeping up to date in microbiology and life science-related news and information is important to you, MicrobeWorld now offers the most convenient way to do so on the go, in your car, at the gym or even in the lab. Purchase the app for $4.99 from the Read More

A team led by Yale University scientists has developed a new approach to studying how immune cells chase down bacteria in our bodies. Their findings are described in the November 15 issue of Nature Methods Advanced Online Publication.

When bacteria enter our bodies they secrete molecules, lea... Read More

Forget cookies and milk. Santa wants the swine flu vaccine.

Many of the nation's Santas want to be given priority for the vaccine and not just because of those runny-nosed kids. There's also the not-so-little matter of that round belly. Research has suggested obesity could be a risk factor.
... Read More

Alan Cann, senior lecturer at the University of Leicester, and colleagues Jo Badge, Stuart Johnson and Alex Moseley, have just published an article/paper on a small experiment involving student use of the microbloging service Twitter and its role in academia. Specifically, Cann and colleagues lo... Read More

The Small Things Considered blog has just started a three-part series on oomycetes, also known as water molds.

The first piece (published today) describes oomycete biology, the other two will focus on a particular oomycete: the late potato blight pathogen.

Here's a clip:

"As you know, ... Read More

Facing political pressure from the Gulf Coast oyster industry, the FDA has backed off a plan to require raw oysters from the Gulf of Mexico to be treated to rid them of Vibrio vulnificus, a potentially deadly bacteria found in warm-water oysters. Harvesters and politicians had warned that the pl... Read More

Experiments at the Pioneer Valley Life Sciences Institute (PVLSI) at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., reported in a recent British Journal of Cancer, confirm that University of Massachusetts Amherst chemical engineer Neil Forbes' delivery and trigger system has for the first time s... Read More

A new study suggests that tooth-binding micelles (or particles) may provide long-term cavity protection by adhering to tooth surfaces and gradually releasing encapsulated antimicrobials. Formulation of a mouthwash-based delivery system is anticipated, ultimately simplifying application and incre... Read More

Nitrification floc. Note the unusual crown shaped bacterium (5200X) Read More

The rhinovirus that causes most cases of the common cold comes in many strains — at least 99, to be exact. As a result, it has long been theorized that a person could be sickened with more than one cold strain at the same time. But recent studies of the common cold and its behavior in the human ... Read More

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New methods of studying avian influenza strains and visually mapping their movement around the world will help scientists more quickly learn the behavior of the pandemic H1N1 flu virus, Ohio State University researchers say.

The researchers linked many powerful computer syste... Read More

A deadly outbreak of E. coli has been traced to a large producer of ground beef that stopped testing its ingredients years ago under pressure from beef suppliers.The outbreak has fueled a growing concern among grocers that not enough is being done to protect their customers.

The United State... Read More

One of the world's great poisoning mysteries may have been solved – the source of the arsenic that turns up in lethal quantities in hundreds of thousands of wells across Bangladesh. The answer is ponds.

Bangladesh occupies the flood-prone delta of the river Ganges. In the past half-century, v... Read More

Apply to the Heatley-Payne Travel Grant for Early Career Scientists on the newly extended deadline of December 1!

The Heatley-Payne Travel Grant has been revamped to allow early career scientists to present an abstract at the annual General Meeting of the UK’s Society for General Microbiology... Read More

The Gainsville Sun is reporting that opposition has put a stop for now to a federal proposal that would have halted the sale of raw oysters from the Gulf of Mexico unless they were treated for a potentially deadly bacteria.

The Food and Drug Administration announced last month that effective ... Read More

It is the perfect way to spoil a vacation, and it has happened 66 times since 2005: an outbreak of gastrointestinal illness aboard a cruise ship. Now a study suggests one possible culprit: dirty restrooms.

Most restrooms on these ships are not being properly cleaned, the authors say, and a sa... Read More

Cigarettes are "widely contaminated" with bacteria, including some known to cause disease in people, concludes a new international study conducted by a University of Maryland environmental health researcher and microbial ecologists at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon in France.

The research team de... Read More

Researchers at the La Jolla Institute for Allergy & Immunology and colleagues have found that previous influenza infections may provide at least some level of immunity to the H1N1 "swine" flu."

The question we asked was, 'Is the swine flu more like the seasonal flu or like a totally new strai... Read More

Structural biologists at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine have described the architecture of the complex of protein units that make up the coat surrounding the HIV genome and identified in it a "seam" of functional importance that previously went unrecognized.

"Our lab experime... Read More

WORCESTER, Mass. – A team of researchers at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) Life Sciences and Bioengineering Center at Gateway Park has developed a new model system to study fungal infections. The system can be a powerful tool for screening potential drug targets for conditions like th... Read More