by Nastassja Noell — Lichens are symbiotic organisms – algae, fungi, cyanobacteria, bacteria and yeasts – that form miniature ecosystems that you can hold in the palm of your hand. They live on trees and rocks throughout the Southern Appalachians, and are also found in the Arctic, the Antarctic, rainforests, alpine tundra and especially in the desert.
by Christoph — I had concluded the first part by saying that I would now discuss what mutations Koga et al. (2022) found in two mutator E. coli lineages that allowed the bacteria to successfully "take over" from Pantoea sp. as symbionts in Plautia stali stinkbugs (termed "improved" lineages.) Here we go...
by Christoph — It is as true as it is, well, boring to keep saying that Escherichia coli is the best understood unicellular organism, and the most-studied with ~41,000 tagged entries in PubMed since 1932. But then, every five years or so, comes a surprise of what unexpected feats this unassuming bacterium is capable of.
by Janie — With the discovery of the 𝘵𝘳𝘱 attenuator in the 1970s, followed shortly by the ColE1 plasmid RNA I, RNA became a much more interesting personality. The biomolecule wears far more hats than mRNA, rRNA, and tRNA. In all its multitudes, RNA seems to boast an infinite functional repertoire...
by Janie — "Three to tango" makes yet another appearance in endosymbioses, this time in the form of a purple-green ciliate that is home to both purple bacteria and green algae. At first glance, this seems like a paradox...
by Rupinder Kaur, Sarah R. Bordenstein, and Seth R. Bordenstein — Amidst a global surge and focus on COVID-19 infections, other diseases that have had and will continue to have impact on human health cannot be forgotten. Dengue, for example, continues to be a major mosquito-borne viral infection, impacting more than 100 million people per year. Dengue can inflict...
