MicrobeWorld

A new paper in PLoS recommends two vaccination strategies to better prevent whooping cough.

"In the absence of adolescent or adult vaccination, pertussis incidence among adults is predicted to more than double in 20 years. Implementing an adult program in addition to childhood and adolescent... Read More

Ho Chi Minh City destroyed nearly 1.5 tons of goat penis contaminated with bacteria Wednesday in the latest chapter of Vietnam’s food safety saga, which has seen putrid pork and rotten beef flood local markets. Read More

New from the CDC:

It is critical to assure that medical offices and other outpatient facilities (e.g., outpatient/ambulatory clinics, outpatient surgery centers, urgent care centers, physical therapy/rehabilitation offices or clinics) that provide routine, episodic, and/or chronic healthcare ... Read More

Guest blogger for Small Things Considered Peter Setlow, Professor of Molecular, Microbial and Structural Biology at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, CT, has an eye-opening post about a recent paper, Read More

This is a strange story here. Apparently, miles and miles of a biological substance has been spotted in the Chukchi Sea, the swath of ocean between Siberia and Alaska. Environmental experts at first thought it may be an oil spill, but on closer examination they believe it's alive.

From the An... Read More

A recent study, "Identification of an immune-responsive mesolimbocortical serotonergic system: potential role in regulation of emotional behavior," suggests that treatment with a specific soil bacterium, Mycobacte... Read More

Cómo se debe cocinar el pavo para el día de acción de gracias
Muchas personas lavan el pavo en el fregadero antes de cocinarlo. Sin embargo, esto no siempre es una buena idea, y... Read More

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Carl Zimmer blogs about his new book, Microcosm and this week focuses on E. coli and genetics. Read More

A very promising cure against infection. Nobel-winning chemist Kary Mullis discusses this break-through antibiotic mechanism. Read More

President Obama yesterday nominated Francis S. Collins, a physician and scientist who helped guide the Human Genome Project to completion, to be the next director of the National Institutes of Health.

Collins, 59, developed an important technique for identifying genes and went on to identify ... Read More

Researchers at the Technische Universität München have identified a metabolic step that could be a good weak point for new antibiotics to target. Just as Luke Skywalker targeted the exhaust-vent on the Death Star, antibiotics could disrupt this specific process and kill the microorganism. Read More

Consider tomorrow’s teleconference (An Update on New Vaccine Recommendations) being held by the American Society for Microbiology and those scheduled over this summer to keep you current about developments in your field and to remain competitive in your industry. The personal knowledge and skil... Read More

The Food and Drug Administration believes antibiotics should be used on livestock only to cure or prevent disease and not to promote growth, a common use, said Principal deputy FDA commissioner Joshua Sharfstein.

"The FDA also believes that the use of medications for prevention and control sh... Read More

German researchers at the Helmholtz Center for Infection Research have developed a method of identifying bacteria by scanning their DNA for short, repetitive segments. Each type of bacteria has unique segments that repeat. This method allows identification using just a fraction of the DNA analys... Read More

Estimates of the proportion of people who will die if infected with swine flu are flawed, say UK researchers.

Currently, the death rate in the UK and the US is estimated at about 0.5 per cent of people who have been infected with the virus. And, accurate estimates are needed so that health au... Read More

According to the BBC, "reports have emerged of people intentionally mixing with friends who have flu. Their reasoning is that it is best to be infected before the winter when the virus could become more deadly. But public health expert Dr Richard Jarvis, chairman of the British Medical Associati... Read More

"On Tuesday, Exxon plans to announce an investment of $600 million in producing liquid transportation fuels from algae — organisms in water that range from pond scum to seaweed. The biofuel effort involves a partnership with Synthetic Genomics, a biotechnology company founded by the genomics pio... Read More

A new study could introduce a pain-free vaccination strategy that works against ear infections developed by Lauren Bakaletz, PhD, director of the Center for Microbial Pathogenesis in The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in collaboration with John Clements, PhD, at Tulane Univ... Read More

An interesting article in the New Scientist looks at solving Darwin's Dilemma, that is, in Darwin's words from the first edition of origin of Species, "If my theory be true, it is indisputable that before the lowest Silurian stratum was deposited... the world swarmed with living creatures. To th... Read More