Small Things Considered

Pepe Casadesús (1951─2022)

by Roberto
If you ever visited the De­part­ment of Ge­net­ics at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Se­vil­la, Spain, you most li­ke­ly met Jo­sep Ca­sa­de­sús; Pe­pe as he was uni­ver­sal­ly known. If you were so ve­ry for­tu­nate, I am sure you still have last­ing and won­der­ful me­mo­ries of that en­coun­ter. Doubt­less, you will re­mem­ber how he... Read more →

A Whiff of Taxonomy – Biostraticola tofi

by Christoph
No, Biostraticola tofi is not a "flagship bacterium" of molecular biology like E. coli, which was re­cent­ly ce­le­bra­ted by Ro­ber­to. In fact, it's hardly known even among hard­core mi­cro­bio­lo­gists! Yet this spe­cies is a close re­la­tive of E. coli, loo­se­ly speak­ing a first cou­sin. But as it goes... Read more →

Talmudic Question #199

Biosynthetic genes for many an­ti­bio­tics evol­ved hund­reds of mil­lions of years ago. Re­sist­ance genes evol­ved con­cur­rent­ly among neigh­bor­ing bac­teria. If most neigh­bors to anti­bio­tic pro­ducers are re­sist­ant, what is... Read more →

Primo Levi's periodic table, and when scientists write fiction

by Janie
There are lots of fantastic books that convey love of a science, depict the braided lines of logic and intuition and luck in experimentation, and depict scientists' lives both in and beyond the lab. Memoir, fiction, biography. Science as metaphor for life, these books will frequently allude to... Read more →

Nature's Drug Factories: Visualising the Invisible

by Munro Passmore
For ge­ne­ral au­dien­ces, science can of­ten seem im­pe­ne­trab­le to un­der­stand be­cause of its in­her­ent scale and com­plex­ity. This is par­ti­cu­lar­ly true in the field of na­tur­al pro­ducts – where we seek to un­der­stand the pro­ces­ses mi­cros­cop­ic or­gan­isms un­der­take to make mo­le­cules we la­ter use as... Read more →

Of Terms in Biology: DGGE

DGGE, to keep the title short, stands for de­na­tur­ing gra­dient gel elec­tro­pho­re­sis. You may won­der what an elec­tro­pho­re­sis tech­nique is do­ing in our 'of Terms in Bio­lo­gy' sect­ion, but it was once a nifty way to ex­plore mi­cro­bial di­ver­si­ty in en­vi­ron­men­tal samp­les. And some­times it still is, which struck me... Read more →

Fine Reading: Antonie van Leeuwenhoek

by Mechas Zambrano and Roberto
The earliest roots of science can be traced to an­cient times in which so-cal­led na­tu­ral phi­lo­so­phers at­temp­ted to ex­plain the world around them. How­ever, the word science, coined in the 14^th cen­tu­ry, and the con­cept of science as the pur­suit of knowledge... Read more →

Ice Ice Maybe

by Janie
The ability to trigger ice formation is a property shared by certain particles both organic and inorganic, including bacteria, viruses, phytoplankton, pollen, soot, dust. These little particles help water molecules come together and form ice at warmer temperatures than freezing point... Read more →

Angela Restrepo - Living on Through Memory

by Mechas Zambrano
Today we can easily bring to mind the names of many women scientists who serve as inspiration and role models. But this was not always the case. Even in the mid-20^th century, women in science were few and far between, especially in developing nations... Read more →

A Dinoflagellate and its Mucosphere

by Christoph
There are strikingly dif­fer­ent table man­ners among hu­man cul­tures past and pre­sent when it comes to food in­gest­ion, who wouldn't know. Not so with our single-cel­led eu­kar­yo­tic re­la­tives, the pro­tists, who gobble up eve­ry­thing that feels and smells about right? Wrong. En­gulf­ment, as bio­lo­gists call this be­ha­vio­ral pro­cess is a bit like put­ting a bowl of ra­men noo­dles to your lips and... Read more →