Tag archives for bacteria
Scientists Discover How Bacteria Changes Ions Into Gold
Posted by Alyson Foster on February 6, 2013 
Bacteria with the ability to change ions into solid gold? This scenario may sound like a biochemist’s version of a fairy tale, but it’s real and scientists at McMaster University have just figured out how the process works.
Bacteria Surviving at High Altitudes Could Play a Role in Global Climate
Posted by Tim Profeta of Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Duke University on January 31, 2013 A new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences indicates that even as high as 30,000 feet in the sky, fungi and bacteria are present in the air. These living microorganisms could very well affect global climate. “The million-dollar question in the field [right now] is how much living things can impact clouds, the hydrological cycle and…
Where’s the beef?
Posted by Dan Klotz on March 20, 2012 
The recent media hullabaloo around “pink slime,” begins with a premise that would be applauded in other situations. A private enterprise, Beef Products Inc (BPI), strives to use every last bit of a resource it has at its disposal—in this case, it’s the beef in the slaughterhouse. But what has come to light about BPI and…
Do we Really Need to use Human Medicine on Farm Animals?
Posted by Dan Klotz on January 6, 2012 The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) took action on Wednesday, January 4 to ban certain uses of one class of drugs, cephalosporins, in raising cattle, pigs, chickens, and turkeys. Cephalosporin drugs are used to treat pneumonia, urinary tract infections, gastro-intestinal diseases, and other life-threatening infections in people; the FDA’s action will help preserve the…
Social Network Connects Members on a Gut Level
Posted by Alyson Foster on September 13, 2011 
MyMicrobes, a new social network started by scientists in the EU, hopes to match up members who share similar types of bacteria.
Birds Do It, Bees Do It…But Why?
Posted by Michael Jourdan on July 11, 2011 
As any biologist will tell you, sex doesn’t seem to make sense. It requires males, which waste resources but don’t directly produce offspring. Why bother with males at all when asexual reproduction is so much more efficient?
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Think you live on caffeine? Four species of bacteria that thrive solely on the substance have you beat.
Posted by This week the Royal Society in London is holding a two day meet-up for scientists to talk about the state of our search for extraterrestrial life. At a lecture today, astrobiologist Paul Davies of Arizona State University told the crowd that he thinks aliens already walk among us. Well, maybe not walk—more like float, or…
Even as sharp new pictures continue to flow in from the recent MESSENGER flyby past Mercury, the folks over at the Cassini-Hyugens program are conducing their own close encounter with Saturn‘s icy moon Enceladus. —Image courtesy NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute This afternoon the Cassini spacecraft made its closest approach yet to the wrinkly-faced moon—a trip that…
