Microbial Diversity: A Journey through Carl Woese\u27s Tree of Life

Review of: Microbial Diversity; James W. Brown; (2015). American Society for Microbiology Press, Washington, DC. 416 pages

The Engaged Microbiologist: Bringing the Microbiological Sciences to the K-12 Community

Exposing K-12 students to cutting edge science that impacts their daily lives can bring classroom lessons to life. Citizen-science projects are an excellent way to bring high-level science to the classroom and help satisfy one of the cornerstone concepts of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), engaging in practices that scientists and engineers actually use. This can be a daunting task for teachers who may lack the background or resources to integrate these projects into the classroom. This is where scientific societies such as the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) can play a critical role. ASM encourages its members to engage with the K-12 community by providing networking opportunities and resources for ASM members and K—12 teachers to work together to bring microbiology into the classroom

A Food Microbiology Classroom Activity to Draw Connections between Microbes and Students’ Lives

Fermented foods have been prepared for millennia and every society around the world has traditional fermented foods and/or beverages that are identified with that culture. This is an excellent opportunity to help students draw connections between their everyday lives and the microbial sciences. At the same time, this is also a great way to encourage cultural awareness and acceptance. This manuscript describes an active learning approach used in a general microbiology course to encourage students to learn about fermented foods from around the world and share their discoveries with their colleagues. As a group we also spend time discussing some of the lesser known roles microbes have in food preparation such as the production of food additives or in modifying starting ingredients. At the end of the semester, students have the opportunity to sample a variety of foods associated with microbes in a “microbe lunch”. We will also describe the use of similar activities in outreach to foster dialogue between scientists and the general public

Succinate Dehydrogenase (Sdh) from Bradyrhizobium japonicum Is Closely Related to Mitochondrial Sdh

The sdhCDAB operon, encoding succinate dehydrogenase, was cloned from the soybean symbiont Bradyrhizobium japonicum. Sdh from B. japonicum is phylogenetically related to Sdh from mitochondria. This is the first example of a mitochondrion-like Sdh functionally expressed in Escherichia coli

Succinate Dehydrogenase (Sdh) from Bradyrhizobium japonicum Is Closely Related to Mitochondrial Sdh

The sdhCDAB operon, encoding succinate dehydrogenase, was cloned from the soybean symbiont Bradyrhizobium japonicum. Sdh from B. japonicum is phylogenetically related to Sdh from mitochondria. This is the first example of a mitochondrion-like Sdh functionally expressed in Escherichia coli

Mobile RFID Management – An Application Scenario on the Handling of Industrial Liquid Containers

This paper deals with concepts, challenges and design alternatives for the application of RFID technology within an industry context. We are especially interested in the combination of RFID technology with positioning information and mobile networks. To discuss these topics, we introduce an application scenario concerning the handling of industrial liquid containers along an integrated supply chain. First we describe the traditional approach and some of the problems involved with it. We then contrast this with an improved process using RFID technology. The scenario is augmented by a discussion of an appropriate application prototype. This paper thus contributes to the debate on RFID and highlights the challenges of integrating various mobile technologies in order to efficiently support supply chain processes

eXamine: a Cytoscape app for exploring annotated modules in networks

Background. Biological networks have growing importance for the interpretation of high-throughput "omics" data. Statistical and combinatorial methods allow to obtain mechanistic insights through the extraction of smaller subnetwork modules. Further enrichment analyses provide set-based annotations of these modules. Results. We present eXamine, a set-oriented visual analysis approach for annotated modules that displays set membership as contours on top of a node-link layout. Our approach extends upon Self Organizing Maps to simultaneously lay out nodes, links, and set contours. Conclusions. We implemented eXamine as a freely available Cytoscape app. Using eXamine we study a module that is activated by the virally-encoded G-protein coupled receptor US28 and formulate a novel hypothesis about its functioning

Tuning Polymorphs and Morphology of Microbially Induced Calcium Carbonate: Controlling Factors and Underlying Mechanisms

Microbially precipitated calcium carbonate (CaCO3) has drawn broad attention due to its potential applications in various areas, for example, biocementation, medicine, and soil reinforcement. Sporosarcina pasteurii (S. pasteurii), formerly known as Bacillus pasteurii, has been investigated for CaCO3 biomineralization due to its high ureolytic activity. A high degree of supersaturation with respect to the presence of bacterial cell wall, extracellular polymeric substances, and organic byproducts of bacterial activity plays an important role in the formation and stabilization of CaCO3 polymorphs. Although microbially induced CaCO3 and its polymorphs have been investigated broadly, the mechanisms of polymorph selection and morphological evolution are not well understood. This study employs ex situ approaches to address the complication of biomineralization in the presence of living organisms and to elucidate how solution chemistry, bacterial activity, and precipitation kinetics alter the polymorphism and morphology of CaCO3 induced by S. pasteurii. The results indicate that in the presence of enough calcium ions and urea (as a carbonate source), the bacterial activity favors the formation and stabilization of vaterite. The morphological observations also provide valuable information on the particles\u27 microstructure. The morphology of calcite evolves from single crystal to polycrystalline structures, and the morphology of vaterite evolved from spherical to oval-shaped structures on increasing the organic material concentration. Specific functional groups also exert morphological control on CaCO3 polymorphs. However, the sensitivity of the calcite polymorph to the composition and orientation of these functional groups is higher compared to that of the vaterite polymorph. These findings offer important insights that can be used to constrain a set of experimental conditions for synthesizing a certain polymorph ratio for vaterite/calcite or a particular morphology of each polymorph and shed light on the crystallization and phase transformation mechanisms in such complicated bioenvironments

Broad-Spectrum Antibacterial Characteristics of Four Novel Borate-Based Bioactive Glasses

Bioactive glasses have been developed for medical applications in the body for bone and tissue repair and regeneration. We have developed a borate-containing bioactive glass (13-93B3, referred to as B3), which is undergoing clinical trials to assess its wound-healing properties. To complement the healing properties of B3, metal ion dopants have been added to enhance its antimicrobial properties. Bioactive glasses doped with silver, gallium or iodine ions were found to have broad spectrum antimicrobial effects on clinically relevant bacteria including MRSA. While the B3 glass alone was sufficient to produce antibacterial effects on select bacteria, adding dopants enhanced the broad-spectrum antibacterial properties: Live-Dead staining fluorescence microscopy suggests cell membrane integrity is disrupted in gram positive bacteria exposed to the glass compounds, but not gram negative bacteria, indicating multiple mechanisms of action for each glass formulation