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MicroBEnet Blogs

A brief summary of the recent topics posted on microBE.net

Blog posts covered a wide range of topics:

Moving public perception from abiotic to probiotic by Kyle Bibby
Fungi on residential surfaces: sinks are sources, other surfaces are sinks by Rachel Adams
Building science measurements in the Hospital Microbiome Project Part 1 by Brent Stephens
Architecture that senses - managing the indoor microbiome for health? by Hal Levin
Why sports teams need resident microbial ecologists by Jonathan Eisen
Announcement of the 2013 Microbiology of the Built Environment Postdoctoral Fellows
Searching for the cure in Saranac Lake by Keith Seifert
Flooding and indoor air quality by Shelly Miller
Your dishwasher, vacuum cleaner and compost are trying to kill you! Or are they? by David Coil

Recent interesting papers:

There were a number of conference reviews:

"Microbes, Indoor Environment and Health- Interdiscipinary Challenges" at the Environment and Health: Bridging South, North, East and West conference held in Basel, Switzerland by Hal Levin
"Environmental Health in Low Energy Buildings" conference held by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers by Rachel Adams
32^nd Annual Conference of the American Association of Aerosol Research in Portland by Shelly Miller
Infectious Disease Week meeting in SF and storify of #IDWeek session on media, social media and open science by Jonathan Eisen

Microbes in the popular press:

Belly button brie: cheese cultured from the body bacteria of celebrities
Microbes in musical instruments and books
Niki Feijen's photos of abandoned farmhouses

Videos:

NPR Animation of the human microbiome
Issues in indoor air quality
The Onion's Centers for Disease Contraction
Project MERCCURI featured on the Today Show (and again!) and in an Inside Science video

Announcements:

Indoor Air 2014, Hong Kong
EPA funding opportunity on indoor air quality and climate change
Sloan Foundation grant renewal for microBEnet

Resource of the Month

Each month we use this space to highlight a particular resource of interest to our readers. This month we are focusing on the Indoor Air Quality Scientific Finding Resource bank. The informative website can be viewed at www.iaqscience.lbl.gov.

This Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Scientific Findings Resource Bank (IAQ-SFRB) is being developed by the Indoor Environment Group of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with funding support from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provided through an interagency agreement. The IAQ-SFRB serves as a resource for public health professionals, building professionals, and others who seek scientific information about the effects of IAQ on people's health or work performance. For general introductory-level background information on IAQ, please see An Overview of IAQ.

The IAQ-SFRB provides information summarizing the state of scientific knowledge about the relationships between people's health and productivity and the IAQ conditions or associated building characteristics in which the people work or reside. When possible, these relationships are expressed in quantitative terms using graphics, charts, or equations. The summaries also include brief descriptions of the actions that may be taken to improve the pertinent aspects of IAQ, including those related to building design, construction, operation, maintenance, and occupant activities. This web site also provides links for downloading published journal articles that were developed specifically for the IAQ-SFRB project.

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Featured Articles

Image by Mlaoxve [Public domain],

via Wikimedia Commons

Art and microbiology meet again but not in the way you might have expected

By Jonathan Eisen

Well, I have always told people that we need more mixing of art and science. In recent years we have seen lots of attempts to do some sort of art inspired by - or even incorporating - microbes. But this is perhaps the other side of the coin. Art is significantly influenced by microbes in various ways and this paper is trying to get at whether the microbial community on art plays a role in its deterioration. Worth a look. PLOS ONE:

Contribution of the Microbial Communities Detected on an Oil Painting on Canvas to Its Biodeterioration.

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Microbes in the built environment: musical instruments (from Discover)

by David Coil

We try to make sure that our discussions of the microbiology of the "built environment" are very inclusive. That means in addition to the obvious houses and office buildings we've talked about plumbing systems, planes, trains, etc. But this story is certainly the first time I've thought about what is dwelling inside of musical instruments. Of course microbes are everywhere but I never thought about the humid environment inside of a brass or wind instrument... that then can get sucked directly into the deep part of the lungs. And as opposed to the usual scare story (e.g. "your dishwasher is trying to kill you") this talks about a few cases where it sounds like the instrument really was a health problem.

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Researchers explore natural solution to rid household plumbing of dangerous pathogens

by David Coil

Just a quick post to point out an article on phys.org talking about Amy Pruden's fascinating work on probiotics for plumbing. Read her microBEnet post about the work here and a related post by Kyle Bibby here.

From the phys.org article:

"We believe this microbiome can be harnessed to control opportunistic pathogens," Pruden said.

For example, benign microbes could out-compete the pathogens for nutrients, space, and other needs, such as the aid of amoeba as hosts. Limiting the number of amoeba with an amoebal virus or bacterial virus is also a strategy, said Falkinham.

In addition, some microbes secrete substances that prevent pathogens from attaching to a surface, which prevents harmful biofilm formation. An alternative approach is chemical synthesis and screens of molecule-mimicking natural inhibitors to control biofilm formation.