MicrobeWorld

More than 70 percent of Americans rank prevention as the most important health care reform priority, and overwhelmingly support increasing funding for prevention programs to reduce disease and keep people healthy.

"In a new public opinion poll released today by the Trust for America's Health ... Read More

h+ magazine is a new web-based periodical that covers "technological, scientific, and cultural trends that are changing — and will change — human beings in fundamental ways."

In the Summer 09 issue, which you can view by clicking source above, there are many interesting articles and interview... Read More

A routine FDA investigation uncovers substandard manufacturing processes at a company that makes 'antimicrobial' skincare products. Oops. Read More

Video from the CBC reports a former researcher at the National Microbiology Lab in Winnipeg is facing charges in the United States after allegedly trying to smuggle genetic material from the Ebola virus across the Manitoba-North Dakota border. This is raising all kinds of flags in Canada over se... Read More

Apparently there is a lot of debate over the term. From the NY Times:

Generations of people have used the term to describe widespread epidemics of influenza, cholera and other diseases. But as the new H1N1 swine influenza virus spreads from continent to continent, it is clear that a useful de... Read More

The dilemma known as 'forward contamination' has been facing NASA since the first foray into space. Essentially, scienitists want to ensure that microbes from Earth don't jeopardize the integrity of samples collected by rovers in case there is a discovery of life on another planet.

"Now rese... Read More

According to research presented at the American Society for Microbiology's 109 General Meeting in Philadelphia, Rogers and Z. Koçer, of Bowling Green State University in Ohio, found that influenza viruses can easily survive freezing in pond water, and emerge from the melting ice strong enough to... Read More

Vaccines intended to help the body to fight off the flu bug may actually give the bug an edge, researchers say.

That doesn't mean vaccines are bad, it just may help explain why they aren't as good as they could be, says Dr. Andrew Mellor, director of the Immunotherapy Center at the Medical Co... Read More

An international team of researchers has identified one of the protein components of a molecular complex that allows light reception in a laboratory fungus.

The results were published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by the team, which includes Prof. Luis M. Cor... Read More

Scientists at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, the South African National Institute for Communicable Diseases of National Health Laboratory Service (NICD-NHLS), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Roche's 454 Life Sciences Corporation have discovered th... Read More

Call it advanced warfare on the most elemental of levels.

Researchers at Texas A&M University's Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering have discovered how certain types of bacteria integrate the DNA that they have captured from invading enemies into their own genetic makeup to incr... Read More

In episode 35 of This Week in Virology, hosts Vincent Racaniello, Alan Dove, Dick Despommier and guest Read More

A promising antimicrobial agent already known to kill bacteria can also kill viruses and stimulate the innate immune system, according to researchers at National Jewish Health. In a paper appearing online June 4 in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, Michael Howell, PhD, Assistant Professo... Read More

Dogfish Head Brewery from Delaware has announced they will be recreating the original recipe of a 9,000 year old brew whose ingredients were deduced from pottery shards found in Northern China.

"University of Pennsylvania molecular archaeologist Patrick McGovern first described the beverage i... Read More

Dengue Fever (DF) and Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever (DHF) are the most important vector-borne viral diseases in the World. Around 50-100 million cases appear each year putting 2.5 billion people at risk of suffering this debilitating and sometimes fatal disease. Dengue Fever is prevalent in the Tropi... Read More

Swine flu reminded us how important washing our hands can be. Studies show that simple handwashing can decrease communicable gastrointestinal diseases by 50% and communicable respiratory diseases by 20%.

Now, with schools at special risk for swine flu, a Tel Aviv University researcher is brin... Read More

"H1N1 flu is casting a distinctly dappled shadow across the Iowa State Fair Grounds, where 18,000 pork producers (including about 3,000 from 50 foreign countries), 450 exhibitors and 2,500 pigs are spending much of this week."

It seems the H1N1 flu and the spread of misinformation regarding i... Read More

Stonyfield Farms, the makers of the popular yogurt brand by the same name, has come up with a special diet for cows in Vermont that helps to reduce methane emissions up to 18% or so. Climatologist are excited about this idea since many vieew cows and their gas as a big threat to climate change.
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In the latest issue of New Scientist, Sheldon Krimsky, adjunct professor in the Department of Public Health and Family Medicine at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, states that the "blurring of the boundaries between independently refereed publications and advertorials is unacceptable.... Read More

The most recent issue of Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science has a great interview with John Barry, historian and author of "The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague In History." The interview discusses his book, it's impact on pandemic pol... Read More