Small Things Considered

Are all stresses oxidative stresses?

by J. Jeffrey Morris | I have a confes­sion to make. I get stres­sed. A lot. I think I've spent the bet­ter part of the last three years with the va­gue feel­ing I'm for­get­ting some­thing real­ly im­por­tant. I bet there are a few people in the rea­ding au­di­ence that can sym­pa­thize – it seems to be a pret­ty com­mon ex­pe­ri­ence for as­sis­tant pro­fes­sors. The stres­sors come... Read more →

Of Terms in Biology: Trophosome

by Elio | A rather specific term, trophosome refers – as per the Wikipedia – to 'an organ found in some animals that houses symbiotic bacteria that provide food for their host.' Trophé (τροφή) denotes nourishment, soma (σῶμα), body, denoting that trophosomes are intimately involved in their host's nutrition. Read more →

A Sulfur For An Oxygen

by Elio | Tampering with the chem­is­try of our ho­liest of mo­le­cules may seem sa­cri­le­gious, but it is wide­spread and con­spi­cuous. In fact, DNA mo­di­fi­ca­tions abound. Think, for star­ters of DNA me­thyl­a­tion, which is the main tool of epi­ge­ne­tics, or an even lon­ger known mo­di­fi­ca­tion, the DNA gly­co­sy­la­tion that in some phages pro­tects their DNA from... Read more →

Extracellular Electron Transfer (EET) Goes Mainstream

by Kevin Blake | Of all the strange ways that bacteria can make a living, mineral respiration ranks among the strangest. Perhaps it’s my anthropomorphic worldview, but the idea of “breathing” solid rock (“No, they’re minerals!” Breaking Bad’s Hank Schrader would shout) seems completely absurd. Read more →

Of Terms in Biology: Moonlighting

by Christoph
The Cambridge Dictionary defines "moon­light­ing" as: the act of work­ing at an ex­tra job, es­pe­ci­al­ly with­out tel­ling your main em­ploy­er. (Far) off the job mar­ket, "moon­light­ing pro­teins" are single po­ly­pep­ti­de chains that per­form mul­ti­ple bio­che­mi­cal or bio­phy­si­cal func­tions in ar­chae­al, bac­te­ri­al, and eu­kar­yo­tic cells. Read more →

The Story of Free Use GFP (fuGFP)

by Nick Coleman and Mark Sommerville | It is per­haps iro­nic that for a sto­ry about open-source sci­ence, the tale of Free Use GFP (fuGFP) be­gins with a com­mer­cial col­la­bo­ra­tion. The Co­le­man lab was con­trac­ted by a small in­dus­try part­ner to de­ve­lop green fluo­res­cent bac­te­ria for qua­li­ty con­trol ap­pli­ca­tions. We plan­ned ini­tial­ly to use su­per­fol­der GFP (sfGFP) for this job, since ... Read more →

Risks and benefits of workouts while fasting (part 2)

by Christoph | You may wonder whether the 'oligo­tro­phic growth state' of Ba­cil­lus sub­ti­lis – the sub­ject of part 1 – isn't just the ca­pri­ole of a do­mes­ti­ca­ted bac­te­ri­um in the lab, and not of much re­le­vance "in the wild." But, as you will soon see, it pro­bab­ly is re­le­vant in na­tu­ral set­tings. But first I have to go back... Read more →

Risks and benefits of workouts while fasting (part 1)

by Christoph | No intro today, I'm about to make one big leap right into the sub­ject. It's about Ba­cil­lus sub­ti­lis but I will not touch what this mul­ti-ta­len­ted bac­te­ri­um is so well known for: spo­ru­la­tion, bio­film for­ma­tion, mo­ti­li­ty by swim­ming, swarm­ing mo­ti­li­ty, can­ni­ba­lism, and "na­tu­ral com­pe­tence" for DNA up­take (aka trans­for­ma­tion). It's about the re­act­ion of B. sub­ti­lis to food de­pri­va­tion. Read more →

The world of small RNAs and regulatory peptides in prokaryotes

by Matthias Gimpel | The natural habitats of most bac­te­ria are cha­rac­te­ri­zed by chan­ging en­vi­ron­men­tal con­di­tions such as fluc­tua­tions in tem­pe­ra­ture, os­mo­la­ri­ty, chan­ging or li­mi­ted nu­trient sup­ply, or the oc­cur­rence of com­pe­ting mi­cro­bes and bac­te­rio­pha­ges. Con­se­quent­ly, fle­xible and ener­gy-ef­fi­cient adap­ta­tion to these chan­ging ex­ter­nal pa­ra­me­ters is the basis for their sur­vi­val. Read more →

The Complex and Mysterious Red Queen

by Jamie | The Red Queen of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass is a prominent figure among evolutionary biologists. Her line to Alice, "‘Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place" struck the biologist Leigh Van Valen as an apt metaphor for the need for species to constantly adapt to the changing environment in order to survive. Read more →