• Why Cal­cify?

    by Roberto — Janie's re­cent Bio-Brick post, where she in­tro­duces mi­cro­bi­al­ly in­duced cal­cite pre­ci­pi­ta­tion, prompt­ed me to con­tinue on the to­pic. In con­trast to the amor­phous chalk Janie de­scribed, which is pro­duced by bac­te­ria from lime­stone, I'll be de­scrib­ing a ve­ry dif­ferent sort of chalk. Still cal­cium car­bo­nate, but with a com­ple­te­ly dif­fer­ent ge­ne­sis.

  • Ehux: The Lit­tle Eu­kary­ote with a Big His­tory

    by Jaime E. Zla­mal — There is an or­gan­ism out there that is smaller than you, older than you, and that has a house that's prob­a­bly fancier than yours. Meet Emil­ia­nia hux­leyi, or Ehux. Ehux is a minis­cule coc­col­ithophore, a beau­ti­ful sin­gle-celled alga that doesn't get enough at­ten­tion in the world of mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy. The ten­dency…