Latest Environmental microbiology Stories

Films of bacteria that form around foreign materials in the body can be very difficult to defeat with drugs, but research led by Brown University biologists has identified a couple proteins that play a key role in building these "biofilms." This pair could prove to be a very important target for developing new antibiotics to fight infections.When a foreign object such as a catheter enters the body, bacteria may not only invade it but also organize into a slick coating "” a biofilm "” that...

A recent University of Michigan study has demonstrated that the Advanced Vapor Technologies' MondoVap 2400 steam vapor device equipped with a Thermal Accelerated Nano Crystal Sanitation (TANCS) water treatment module, rapidly and effectively destroys microbial biofilms; those sticky, often invisible films formed by bacteria and other germs to colonize surfaces and protect themselves from attack by disinfectants and other antimicrobial agents. The MondoVap with TANCS technology uses only...

Research gives clearer picture of inhabitants living in ocean surface and gleans insights into how they adapt and survive ROCKVILLE, Md. and SAN DIEGO, Nov. 3, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Researchers at the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), a not-for-profit genomic research organization, published results today describing the sequencing and analysis of 137 marine microbial genomes living in the global ocean surface. The research was published by JCVI lead authors Shibu Yooseph and...

'Walking' bacteria, kidney stones addressed in junior faculty members' health-related workResearchers can spend entire careers producing outstanding work but still not see their efforts featured in the pages of Science, one of the world's most prestigious scientific journals. That won't be the case, though, for two junior faculty members in engineering at the University of Houston (UH).Jacinta Conrad and Jeff Rimer, both assistant professors in Cullen College of Engineering's department of...

BELGRADE, Mont., Oct. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Bacterin International Holdings, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: BIHI) ("Bacterin"), today announced that it is scheduled to present at the upcoming Singular Research 5th Annual Best of the Uncovereds conference on Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 3:20p.m.(PT) at the Luxe Hotel Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California. Guy Cook, Founder & CEO of Bacterin, and John Gandolfo, Bacterin's chief financial officer, will review and provide an update on the...

Many countries now acknowledge the need to obtain their energy supply from renewable sources such as biomass. Prof. Verstraete will explain how his team have developed a new anaerobic digestion reactor which can generate as much electricity as 25 wind turbines. These reactors use a consortium of methanogenic (methane-producing) bacteria to degrade waste and energy crops to produce biogas (a mixture of methane and carbon) which is then converted to electricity using a turbine.We were reminded...

Much as an anthropologist can study populations of people to learn about their physical attributes, their environs and social structures, some marine microbiologists read the genome of microbes to glean information about the microbes themselves, their environments and lifestyles.Using a relatively new methodology called comparative population genomics, these scientists compare the entire genomes of different populations of the same microbe to see which genes are "housekeeping" or...

BELGRADE, Mont., Oct. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- Bacterin International Holdings, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: BIHI) ("Bacterin"), today announced Guy Cook, President & CEO of Bacterin will be presenting at the 6th Annual Fall Growth Stock Conference hosted by Security Research Associates, Inc. ("SRA"). The conference will be held on Tuesday, October 26th at the Westin St. Francis in San Francisco. Bacterin is scheduled to present at 1:00 p.m. (PT). The presentation will be broadcast live over...

Across the globe, the diversity of plant and animal species generally increases from the North and South Poles towards the Equator but surprisingly that rule isn't true for soil bacteria, according to a new study by Queen's University biology professor Paul Grogan."It appears that the rules determining the patterns for plant and animal diversity are different than the rules for bacteria," says Professor Grogan.The finding is important because one of the goals in ecology is to explain patterns...

Farming practices have a significant impact on the diversity of beneficial microbial fungi known to play important roles in crop productivity, soil recovery and maintenance of healthy ecosystems, according to new research published today (14 September 2010) in the journal Environmental Microbiology. The conclusions could have important implications for the way humans manage the agricultural landscape and tackle food security issues.The study was led by Dr Christopher van der Gast at the...