Tag: bacteria
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The Bacteria that Live in Your Coffee Maker
This article was originally posted on RealClearScience. Wherever you live, bacteria live. Wherever you can’t live, bacteria live. From hydrothermal vents to acid mines, microbes have the planet covered. They also have your Nespresso machine covered. Recently, Spanish researchers decided to inventory the microbial community that dwells inside George Clooney’s favorite coffee maker.
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A Revolution in Basic Microbiology?
Harnessing the untapped potential of microorganisms often begins by growing them in the lab.
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The Primordial Soup Was Edible
The Miller-Urey gunk can support life.
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Protecting Coffee Crops: Beetles and Bugs
THE coffee-berry borer is a pesky beetle. It is thought to destroy $500m-worth of unpicked coffee beans a year, thus diminishing the incomes of some 20m farmers. The borer spends most of its life as a larva, buried inside a coffee berry, feeding on the beans within. To do so, it has to defy the…
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How Yellowstone Revolutionized Biotechnology
The beautiful hot springs played a direct role in the biotechnology revolution.
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Pathogen Jumped from Humans to Rabbits in 1976
We should always remember that as humans continue to expand our footprint around the globe, we may be only one mutation away from being infected with a strange and dangerous new pathogen.
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Solar Fuel: Converting Sunlight to Alcohol
It’a a neat trick, but the bioelectrochemical cell essentially takes an inefficient process and reduces its efficiency even further.
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Will Propane-Making Bacteria Revolutionize Energy?
Researchers are looking for ways to produce renewable “fossil fuels” through the use of alternative technologies, such as synthetic biology.
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Evolution Needs to Be Seen to Be Believed
Indeed, seeing is believing.
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Microbial Warfare: Anthrax Assassin
A DEAD zebra in the open savannah of Namibia’s Etosha National Park would be an off-putting encounter for most people. But for Holly Ganz of the University of California, Davis and an international team of researchers, the striped ungulate’s carcass reeked of opportunity. Read the rest at The Economist.