Biology Bytes
microbes
What is a “Healthy” Gut Microbiome?
Which types of microbes are good to have in our guts — belonging to our gut microbiome — and which microbes shouldn’t be there for us to be healthy? It turns out that this is a very complicated question. Over the past couple of years, the gut microbiome has been found to be related to … Continue reading
A Parasitic Amoeba Kills Cells by Eating Them
Amoebas are fascinating single-celled organisms. They typically move about by having their internal fluid (their cytoplasm) flow around and they eat their food by surrounding and digesting it with their body, in a process called phagocytosis. Some amoeba are parasites, such as Entamoeba histolytica, which can infect people and cause a potentially fatal diarrheal disease … Continue reading
Building a Genome: The First Synthetic Yeast Chromosome
When you were a kid, did you ever dream up fantastical creatures, like cats with wings or super-intelligent dogs that could speak? While we’re nowhere near making such animals, we’re definitely becoming increasingly better at genetically modifying the organisms around us. One amazing recent breakthrough is the creation of a synthetic yeast chromosome. This is … Continue reading
Chocolate: It Does a Microbe Good
It’s always nice to find out that a food we enjoy eating — something we might even consider to be a treat — is actually healthy and beneficial for us to eat. For example, if you like dark chocolate, then there’s some good news for you. Earlier this week it was reported that eating dark … Continue reading
Giant Viruses!
In the last year, multiple new “giant viruses” have been discovered that are challenging what it means to be a virus… and what it means to be alive. Giant viruses are so much bigger than other viruses that until the early 2000s some had been miscategorized as bacteria — the upper size limits that defined … Continue reading
The Necrobiome: How Our Bacteria Change After Death
While we are alive, we have intimate relationships with the microbes — the microscopic bacteria, yeast, and other critters — that live on, and inside of, our bodies. We’re only just beginning to learn about the vital roles these microbiomes play, but already we’ve found they’re closely tied to aging, as well as medical conditions … Continue reading
How Oxygen Helped Life to Flourish
About 4.5 billion years ago, our planet formed. Around a billion years later, the first life forms appeared, which were mostly single-celled microbes, and this is pretty much how life was on our planet for billions of years. Then, about 540 million years ago (or some three billion years after those microbes first appeared), multicellular … Continue reading
Millions of Dead Sea Stars
I hesitated writing about this story because researchers really do not seem to know at all what is causing this catastrophe, yet, but doing science is primarily about solving mysteries – it’s really part of the scientific process. What exactly is the story? As you may have heard, potentially millions of sea stars (also known … Continue reading
Aging and the Gut Microbiome
The more we learn about them, the clearer it’s becoming that the microbiomes that surround us – and live inside of us – serve vital functions for us. (Microbiomes are collections of microbes, such as bacteria and yeast, which live together in a certain area.) Just last week, we looked at the microbes living in … Continue reading
Microbes in Beijing’s Smog
When we think of smog and what’s in it, what probably comes to mind first is the chemical pollutants. But what about the microbes? More and more we’re discovering the importance of the complex web of microbes that are all around – and inside of – us. Which brings us to a study published earlier … Continue reading