bacteria

From ScienceDaily: A concept known as ‘percolation’ is helping microbiologists explain how communities of bacteria can effectively relay signals across long distances. Once regarded as a simple cluster of microorganisms, communities of bacteria have been found to employ a strategy we use to brew coffee and extract oil from the sea. Percolation helps the microscopic community thrive and survive threats, such as chemical attacks from antibiotics. … Biofilm communities inhabit locations all around us, from soil to drain pipes to the surface of our teeth. Cells at the edge of these communities tend to grow more robustly than their interior counterparts because they have access to more nutrients. To keep this edge growth in check and ensure the entire community Read More ›

From Josh Bloom at American Council for Science and Health: I recently wrote about three of the deadly neurotoxins being produced by cyanobacteria (aka blue-green algae) during an ongoing algae bloom in South Florida (See Florida’s Deadly Algae Bloom – Why Is It So Dangerous?). The toxins range from structurally simple and easy for organic chemists to synthesize in the lab to moderately complex and not simple at all. But there are numerous examples of plants, marine organisms, and bacteria that easily biosynthesize molecules that are so complex and difficult to make synthetically that chemistry grad students and post-docs who were given the unenviable task of doing so are probably still waking up in cold sweats thinking about what they Read More ›

Researchers: Half of iron atoms in some cores were processed by microbes 2.5 bya/Clark Johnson 2.5 billion years ago? That’s the theory here: These ancient deposits, up to 150 meters deep, were begging for explanation, says Johnson. Scientists thought the iron had entered the ocean from hot, mineral-rich water released at mid-ocean vents that then precipitated to the ocean floor. Now Johnson and Li, who is currently at Nanjing University in China, show that half of the iron in banded iron was metabolized by ancient bacteria living along the continental shelves. More. … Biologists say this process “is really deep in the tree of life, but we’ve had little evidence from the rock record until now,” Johnson says. “These ancient Read More ›