Bring­ing the Mi­cro­bial World into our Nat­ural His­tory Mu­se­ums

by Scott Chim­i­leski

Have you ever vis­ited a nat­ural his­tory mu­seum and looked for mi­crobe ex­hibits? If you have, I'd bet you didn't find any. In my own searches, I usu­ally see mi­crobes rep­re­sented only by some species names writ­ten on a tree of life, or by a mi­nor sec­tion of an­other ex­hibit. When I first re­al­ized that mi­cro­bial life is a small frac­tion of con­tent on dis­play, I was shocked. "The nat­ural his­tory of Earth is a story of mi­crobes!" I thought. "Where are the bac­te­ria and ar­chaea, the pro­tists, the fungi? You know – the ones that make up most of the global phy­lo­ge­netic di­ver­sity and bio­mass?" To a mi­cro­bi­ol­o­gist, this ap­par­ent over­sight could be dis­heart­en­ing. How­ever, I am here to say that we should be in­spired to rise to the chal­lenge. What we re­ally have be­fore us, is a call to ac­tion: a great op­por­tu­nity to open up the mi­cro­bial world for the pub­lic.

Fig­ure 1. The Har­vard Uni­ver­sity Mu­seum in Cam­bridge, Mass­a­chu­setts is one of the old­est mu­se­ums in the United States.

First, why is it so im­por­tant that we bring the mi­cro­bial world into our mu­se­ums? Be­cause in re­al­ity, there's a dis­con­nect be­tween the mod­ern un­der­stand­ing of mi­crobes and how most peo­ple think of mi­crobes. In my ex­pe­ri­ence, some three quar­ters of peo­ple fear mi­crobes, cat­e­go­riz­ing all of them as "germs" that cause sick­ness or other prob­lems. While ASM has ex­cel­lent re­sources that reach be­yond mi­cro­bi­ol­o­gists to coun­ter­act such un­founded mi­crobo­pho­bia (in­clud­ing the Mi­crobe­World web­site and this blog), mu­se­ums are where the rub­ber hits the road be­tween sci­ence and the pub­lic. If mi­crobes are miss­ing there, many will never ap­pre­ci­ate the mi­cro­bial world and mis­con­cep­tions about them will per­sist.

Fig­ure 2. Given that most mi­crobes in na­ture re­main to be char­ac­ter­ized, there's no end to the beauty of mi­cro­bial forms out there to be ob­served. Pic­tured here is a va­ri­ety of mi­cro­bial iso­lates grow­ing as colonies or mi­grat­ing across sur­faces. Source

But let's face the facts. An­i­mals have a big ad­van­tage over mi­crobes for mu­seum ex­hibits: we can see them. We have an in­her­ent cu­rios­ity for learn­ing about crea­tures that run, swim, fly and climb past us. They have a lifestyle re­lat­able to our own. The chal­lenge is, how can we dis­play mi­crobes that are usu­ally in­vis­i­ble, and whose bi­ol­ogy seems so alien? Well, I'd guess you can ac­tu­ally imag­ine many so­lu­tions for this. Af­ter all, as we know, mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy can be a very vi­sual, if not even artis­tic en­deavor.

Here are some ideas that I am work­ing on. Listed be­low are three key con­cept ar­eas that we revel in as mi­cro­bi­ol­o­gists, along with cor­re­spond­ing "take-home mes­sages" for the pub­lic, and a plan for how each can be com­mu­ni­cated vi­su­ally within an in­ter­ac­tive multi-me­dia ex­hibit.

Con­cept area #1: So­cial­ity, com­mu­nity, mul­ti­cel­lu­lar­ity and col­lec­tive be­hav­ior

Mes­sage   Mi­crobes are im­mersed in minia­ture ecosys­tems not un­like a macro­scopic for­est. Here, they com­mu­ni­cate through chem­i­cal lan­guages, rec­og­nize self from non-self, live, move and work to­gether within struc­tured com­mu­ni­ties, and co­op­er­ate and com­pete for re­sources.

Pre­sen­ta­tion

1. 3D prints of biofilms and other mi­cro­bial com­mu­ni­ties – large enough to be touched and ap­pre­ci­ated by chil­dren and oth­ers. As a proof of con­cept, I printed a 500x real-size model of a Haloferax vol­canii biofilm based on con­fo­cal imag­ing data.

2. Large-for­mat pho­to­graphic prints of colonies and swarms (as in Fig­ure 2). I've al­ready made what are to my knowl­edge the largest can­vas prints of mi­cro­bial colonies ever pro­duced, start­ing from ul­tra-high res­o­lu­tion im­ages (Fig­ure 3). I am work­ing on more for a num­ber of species.

3. Time-lapse movies of biofilm de­vel­op­ment, in­ter­species in­ter­ac­tions (e.g., an­tibio­sis), swarm­ing and other col­lec­tive be­hav­iors, such as Myx­o­coc­cus xan­thus group preda­tory ac­tiv­ity

4. 3D mod­els of au­toin­duc­ers and other sig­nal mol­e­cules: dis­played to­gether as phys­i­cal rep­re­sen­ta­tions of mi­cro­bial "words" within the com­plex chem­i­cal ecol­ogy of this un­seen world

5. Printed im­ages and movies of cells "fight­ing" through tit-for-tat in­ter­ac­tions (based on the Type VI se­cre­tion sys­tem), bound­ary for­ma­tion be­tween strains of Pro­teus mirabilis, and mul­ti­ple func­tional cell types aris­ing within a sin­gle bac­te­r­ial species.
 

Con­cept area #2: The shapers and stew­ards of our planet

Fig­ure 3. A 52 x 40 inch gi­clée can­vas print of a bac­te­r­ial colony (>100x real-size).

Mes­sage   Mi­crobes were the first or­gan­isms on Earth, they in­flu­ence ge­o­log­i­cal processes and drive bio­geo­chem­i­cal cy­cles, hu­man so­ci­ety de­pends on them, and their ac­tiv­ity is tan­gi­ble.

Pre­sen­ta­tion

1. Fos­silized stro­ma­to­lites and other ex­hibits em­pha­siz­ing the in­ter­sec­tion be­tween ge­ol­ogy and mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy

2. Ex­hibits high­light­ing tan­gi­ble prod­ucts of mi­cro­bial ac­tiv­ity (e.g., their abil­ity to pro­duce elec­tric­ity within a mi­cro­bial fuel cell)

3. "A Life in a World with­out Mi­crobes" in­spired ex­hibit, un­der­lin­ing the role that mi­crobes play within the bios­phere, and what would likely hap­pen if they sud­denly dis­ap­peared.

Con­cept area #3: An­i­mal-mi­cro­bial sym­bioses and the hu­man mi­cro­biota

Fig­ure 4. Above: The bio­di­ver­sity of the macro­scopic liv­ing world is rep­re­sented at the HMNH with ex­pan­sive an­i­mal col­lec­tions. Cen­ter: The fu­ture space of the ex­hi­bi­tion on the mi­cro­bial world. (Here a prior ex­hibit is shown, Thoreau's Maine Woods.) Be­low: A pre­lim­i­nary ren­der­ing of what a mi­cro­bial world nat­ural his­tory ex­hibit might look like

Mes­sage   Sym­bi­otic as­so­ci­a­tions be­tween an­i­mals and mi­crobes are a com­mon theme of life on Earth. Our bod­ies are land­scapes har­bor­ing mi­cro­bial ecosys­tems, in­clud­ing many species that con­tribute pos­i­tively to our well-be­ing.

Pre­sen­ta­tion

1. Printed im­ages and videos of mi­crobes liv­ing with tube­worms, mus­sels, clams and ants   

2. Aquar­i­ums with live flash­light fish or Hawai­ian bob­tail squid

3. Life-sized mod­els for vi­su­al­iz­ing mi­cro­bial di­ver­sity mapped onto the hu­man body

Now, on to the im­por­tant ques­tion of where to start. In 2014, I be­gan plan­ning a project for the pub­lic un­der­stand­ing of mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy with Roberto Kolter in Boston. I am happy to tell you that an ex­hibit on the mi­cro­bial world is set to open at the Har­vard Mu­seum of Nat­ural His­tory (HMNH), backed by Harvard's Mi­cro­bial Sci­ences Ini­tia­tive. In my opin­ion, the HMNH is an ideal venue. Show­cas­ing world-class an­i­mal, fos­sil and ge­o­log­i­cal col­lec­tions, the mu­seum at­tracts over 250,000 peo­ple each year. It is also rich in his­tory: the ad­join­ing Mu­seum of Com­par­a­tive Zo­ol­ogy (MCZ) was es­tab­lished in 1859 – the same year that Dar­win pub­lished On the Ori­gin of Species. Yet, be­ing on the smaller side, HMNH vis­i­tors can move quickly from the mi­cro­bial world, around the cor­ner and into amaz­ing an­i­mal ex­hibits (see Fig­ure 4), able to draw par­al­lels be­tween the beauty, di­ver­sity and in­ter­ac­tiv­ity of all life.

At present, I am part of a team work­ing to de­velop this project for the HMNH, in­clud­ing Roberto Kolter, Colleen Ca­vanaugh, Pe­ter Gir­guis, An­drew Knoll, along with Har­vard Mu­se­ums of Sci­ence and Cul­ture Ex­ec­u­tive Di­rec­tor Jane Pick­er­ing and Di­rec­tor of Ex­hi­bi­tions, Ja­nis Sacco. We are cur­rently hold­ing monthly meet­ings, brain­storm­ing ideas for themes and con­tent, and es­tab­lish­ing a time­line to­wards an open­ing date in early 2017.

Ul­ti­mately, I hope the fu­ture HMNH ex­hibit and sim­i­lar ef­forts will cause a domino-ef­fect across nat­ural his­tory mu­se­ums in the United States. Al­ready work­ing in our fa­vor, is the world's first "mi­crobe zoo," Mi­cropia, now open in Am­s­ter­dam. Prepa­ra­tions are also un­der­way for an ex­hibit on the mi­cro­biome at New York City's Amer­i­can Mu­seum of Nat­ural His­tory.

I'd like to leave you with a fa­mil­iar quote from E.O. Wil­son (Fac­ulty Emer­i­tus at the MCZ):

"If I could do it all over again, and re­live my vi­sion in the twenty-first cen­tury, I would be a mi­cro­bial ecol­o­gist ... Into that world I would go with the aid of mod­ern mi­croscopy and mol­e­c­u­lar analy­sis. I would cut my way through clonal forests sprawled across grains of sand, travel in an imag­ined sub­ma­rine through drops of wa­ter pro­por­tion­ately the size of lakes, and track preda­tors and prey in or­der to dis­cover new life ways and alien food webs."

—Nat­u­ral­ist, 1994

My per­sonal mo­ti­va­tion for the HMNH ex­hibit is to bring this quote to life. Wil­son cap­tures a fas­ci­na­tion for the mi­cro­bial world that every­one is ca­pa­ble of hav­ing. It is un­for­tu­nate, that nearly all peo­ple mar­vel at the plan­ets, stars and galax­ies we study through a tele­scope, but that this same cu­rios­ity and hu­man de­sire to ex­plore has not yet caught on for the in­verse – for those small things we see through a mi­cro­scope.

A lot has hap­pened in mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy since Wil­son wrote this in 1994. We can now quite lit­er­ally cut through mi­cro­bial clonal forests. We have an in­cred­i­ble un­der­stand­ing of mi­cro­bial life ways, of these preda­tors and prey and alien food webs. It is time to share what we have dis­cov­ered, to bring the pub­lic into this world, and to in­spire a new at­ti­tude, mi­cro­bio­philia.

 

Scott Chim­i­leski is a post­doc­toral fel­low in Roberto Kolter's lab­o­ra­tory at the Har­vard Med­ical School in Boston, MA. Scott also writes on his own mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy blog, An­i­mal­cule. More of his mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy pho­tog­ra­phy can be found on his port­fo­lio web­site, Into the Mi­cro­bial World.