by Alise Muok and Ariane Briegel
Try to imagine a creature that can survive from the heat of 150°C (300°F) to the cold of –270°C (–454°F), in the absence of oxygen, after complete dehydration, at 1,000× atmospheric pressure, and after the radiation and vacuum of space. Who might such space travelers be?
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Space-tolerant Micronauts
Talmudic Question #169
Lactose is rarely found in Nature except for mammalian milk. How come?
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A Vertical Symbiont Keeps Its Chromosome Oriented Towards The Host
by Philipp Weber
Have you ever heard of 'Candidatus Thiosymbion oneisti' It is a rod-shaped bacterium that attaches, via one of its poles, to the cuticle of a marine nematode. Oneisti is committed to have each daughter cell in constant and intimate contact with its host. To accomplish this, it cannot simple elongate along...
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Hans Christian Gram
by Elio and Roberto
In 2013, an article on the Gram stain appeared in these pages. It celebrated the persistence of this procedure in microbiology, as well as its origins. In the early days of bacteriology, staining was a key technique, at first even more important than cultivation.
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A Shuttle Service for Phosphate
by Christoph
It's amazing, again and again, to see electron microscopic images of orderly chains of electron-dense, membrane-enclosed magnetite crystals within bacterial cells that turn their carriers into tiny compass needles. So, it's no surprise that here at STC, Elio, Gemma, and Daniel had been attracted by magnetotactic bacteria (MTBs) earlier. Now we teamed up with Vivienne Baillie Gerritsen from Protein Spotlight,...
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How Do Tardigrades Withstand Drying?
by Elio
Recently, tardigrades or water bears made the news because they had been loaded on a space capsule headed for the moon. Alas, the spacecraft crashed on its way down and the fate of the tiny passengers is unknown. This gives us a reason for revisiting these fascinating creatures and to bring the topic up to date.
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Strictly Intracellular Parasite No More
by Elio
We learn with mother's milk (or at least in a beginning microbiology course) that certain bacteria, notably rickettsiae, chlamydiae, and anaplasmas, cannot grow outside of host cells. Thus, they are defined as being strictly intracellular parasites. Ha! A member of the rickettsiae has now been found to grow freely outside of host cells.
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In and About Copenhagen
by Roberto
Not too many months ago Elio posted an engaging and very personal essay of his two years in Copenhagen. Those years spanned from 1956 to 1958, a mere 62 years ago, at a time when I was still in pre-school. While editing Elio's text, I was quite taken by his description of those days as "most likely the happiest of my life."
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Making Memories with Pseudomonas aeruginosa
by Jade Thurnham
As an opportunistic pathogen, Pseudomonas aeruginosa lurks in wait of the perfect moment to make its move and become infectious in its host. Since it is so flexible in its choice of dwellings, P. aeruginosa is highly adaptive in its ability to couch surf among a wide range of hosts. But how does such an adaptation work and why is P. aeruginosa so good at it?
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