MicrobeWorld

This is an amazing story:

"For eight years, Jessica Terry suffered from stomach pain so horrible, it brought her to her knees. The pain, along with diarrhea, vomiting and fever, made her so sick, she lost weight and often had to miss school.

Her doctors, no matter how hard they tried, cou... Read More

The San Francisco Chronicle has published a light-hearted interview with J. Craig Venter, "one of the leading scientists of the 21st century, a man who has rattled the establishment, turned biology into a high-stakes race and was the first human being to have his entire genome sequenced." I say ... Read More

PPPPAAAAANNNNNDDDDDEEEEMMMMMIIIIIICCCCCCC!!!!

The World Health Organization told its member nations it was declaring a swine flu pandemic Thursday — the first global flu epidemic in 41 years — as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.

In a ... Read More

Breaking News from the WHO via SkyNews:

In a statement to member countries, the WHO said it decided to raise the pandemic alert level from phase five to six, meaning that a global outbreak of swine flu has begun.

The decision was made after the UN health agency held an emergency meeting on... Read More

The World Health Organization recommended last week that the vaccine against rotavirus, a diarrheal disease that kills 500,000 children a year, be given to every child in the world.

More than 85 percent of those deaths are of poor children in Africa, Asia and Latin America, and the W.H.O. end... Read More

Where a textile mill once drove the economy of this blue-collar town northeast of Charlotte, an imposing neoclassical complex is rising, filled with fine art, Italian marble and multimillion-dollar laboratory equipment. Three buildings, one topped by a giant dome, form the beginnings of what has... Read More

Ratas que olfatean la tuberculosis

Los científ... Read More

Antibiotics, antimicrobials and antifungals are seeping into the waterways of North America, Europe and East Asia, according to an investigation published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP). Authored by Université de Montréal and Environment Canada researchers, ... Read More

Just in time for discussions on the Food Safety Enhancement Act is the Friday opening of a new documentary called Food, Inc. From the official website - "Filmmaker Robert Kenner lifts the veil on our nation's food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that has been hidden from the ... Read More

Sciam reports that "many animals, including man's best friend, also suffer from both short-lived and chronic digestive woes. As a result, some veterinarians have begun prescribing supplements containing friendly bacteria, or "probiotics," to ease related symptoms such as diarrhea, vomiting, gas ... Read More

The Scientific American has a new article out that looks at the potential impact of global warming on methane release in the arctic.

"In a complete Arctic thaw, these lakes could discharge a whopping 50 billion tons of methane: 10 times the amount already helping to heat the planet.

Whethe... Read More

For those of you interested in the Food Safety Enhancement Act click source above to view the official discussion site, see a pdf of the draft language and view a pdf summary document. This is currently being discussed in the House today. Read More

Looks like today is the day that the House will mark up the Food Safety Enhancement Act that will put into place new food safety regulations.

here are some highlights from the draft bill via the Daily Kos:

* Gives the FDA mandatory recall authority.

* Requires all food producers... Read More

A new, easy-to-perform method for detecting both seasonal influenza A virus and the emerging H1N1 swine-derived influenza A virus in human clinical samples offers a fast, sensitive, and cost-effective diagnostic test that runs on standard laboratory equipment. This timely and broadly applicable ... Read More

Yes, it sounds crazy, but Bio-Reaction Industries says it has devised a way to exploit bacteria to cleanse the air inside paint shops and factories.

Water, microorganisms, soil and a ball that could pass like a cat toy: Together, they can drastically cut the cost of air purification, accordin... Read More

Montezuma's Revenge explained?

Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM), the Naval Medical Research Center and the National Institutes of Health, have solved the structure of thin hair-like fibers called "pili" or "fimbriae" on the surface of bacteria that cause traveler's d... Read More

The World Health Organization (WHO) is on the verge of declaring the first influenza pandemic in more than 40 years, but wants to ensure countries are well prepared to prevent a panic, its top flu expert said on Tuesday.

Keiji Fukuda, acting WHO assistant director-general, voiced concern at t... Read More

Microbes are extremely small organisms such as bacteria, protozoa and fungi. Even though we can't easily see them, they are all around us. Like it or not, microbes live on us and inside us. When people talk about "germs," they're generally talking about microbes.

Many diseases are caused by m... Read More

A synthetic DNA binding compound has proved surprisingly effective at binding to the DNA of bacteria and killing all the bacteria it touched within two minutes. The DNA binding properties of the compound were first discovered in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Warwick by Profess... Read More

Interesting conclusion of research on the roundworm C. elegans by a group at the Massachusetts General Hospital led by Sean P. Curran and Gary Ruvkun suggest that while "people die, one part of them, at least in principle, is immortal."

"The finding may provide an explanation for the many rec... Read More