by Christoph — In a post two month ago, I referred to 'defensive symbioses'. In a nutshell: one or more symbiotic bacteria produce a cocktail of antibiotics that provide protection of a eukaryotic host against an array of opportunistic bacterial and fungal pathogens. I introduced the term not in contrast but...
by Christoph — We had learned earlier that Philanthus triangulum beewolves – solitary digger wasps that prey on bees, hence their name – employ a "cocktail" of nine different antibiotics to protect their offspring from detrimental fungal infections. The antibiotics are produced – I repeat from the earlier post – by a bacterial symbiont, 'Candidatus Streptomyces philanthi', which the...
by Daniel P. Haeusser — Today I wanted to catch up with some recent books that visitors to this blog may have interest in adding to their microbiological library. So here is a roundup of six academic microbial titles of note that make up a trio of related pairs.
...Towards More Ecological Antimicrobial Therapies
by Roberto — The remarkable transformation in the control of infectious diseases by antibiotics is one of the glorious stories in microbiology. But now, almost inseparable from their discovery and application, is its nasty sequel, the rapid evolution of antibiotic resistance. We continually read reports of the dire public health situation that we may...
The gut microbiome, from a single member, Akkermansia muciniphila, to the effect of antibiotics on its composition and colonization resistance against C. difficile.
by Christoph — Having studied the famous Luria-Delbrück experiment from 1943, you know, as a geneticist, how to "make" an E. coli strain resistant to the streptomycin: grow cells to late-log phase in a flask, withdraw 1 ml of the culture, spread 0.1 ml aliquots on several agar plates containing 20 µg/ml of the antibiotic, and incubate the plates overnight...
