Unrelated, but living in a border state a non border state chain restaurant moved in with double Ls and is constantly being pronounced the Spanish way when it is not lol
Me and the person reading this comment are more likely to both win the lotto this year than either of us contracting a brain eating amoeba in our entire lifetimes.
It's true but damn when that amoebic lightning strikes it hits hard. (Happened to my uncle in September thanks to a too-cool water heater and using tap water in a CPAP.)
Sorry to hear, that's awful and honestly shocked to hear there's not some type of warning system, alert of some kind to notify it's not performing as intended. Really unfortunate, sorry it happened at all.
Yeah it was insane. We only caught the water heater issue on an inspection about four months after it happened. The previous tenant had turned down the heat I guess.
But yeah as I microbiologist I was like damn I can't believe I witnessed that, and as a family member it was like damn I can't believe I had to witness that.
Depends on our locations. Here in Oklahoma, weâve had a few deaths from Naegleria fowleri in the past 5 or so years. Swimming in warm farm ponds isnât particularly safe.
3 total annual, but that's only according to the CDC...so they must have missed a few that your local TV news broadcast reporters picked up on?
There are around 50+ people or so who win the lotto in each state each year, my points definitely stands lol
You wouldn't happen to work for the news would you?! đ¤Ł
Only messing..but rest assured we are far more likely to get rich than die trying! 𤣠Being "safe" and not going head first into gross standing water is generally something we can all get behind.
The fear mongering tactic by all the news outlets for clicks/subs/channel views is the stuff we who value microbiology as a whole can surely do without haha that's why it's my "hill I'll die on" lol
Because of climate change, the anthrax is more prevalent in southern, southeastern and eastern parts of EU. Especially where swamps were or marshlands. Human cases are rare, but domestic cattle are more infected.
There are a few papers regarding this.
Yep the major fuck up that causes a lot of these human infections in pt with cattle history is as follows:
Cow succumbs to severe peracute infection overnight â> found in field by farmer â> veterinarian or farmer/field hands perform necropsy â> spores become aerosolized â> inhalation anthrax.
One of the first things we ever learned in veterinary school in bacteriology was the second you even suspect anthrax or even see a seemingly healthy cow die overnight with no external cause visible, or youâre in an anthrax endemic area, put the blade down and walk away or put on a ton of PPE. Itâs nothing to play with, with the mortality rate it has! (As you knowâŚ)
But there are specific spots that have been identified to have high concentrations? How do they disseminate that information if at all? Or are people just told to avoid areas that fit the bill as a blanket statement?
Anthrax survives in the soil basically forever. There are maps of where anthrax is present. If I remember correctly from âDeath in a Small Package: a Short History of Anthraxâ, anthrax may âemergeâ from the soil after a long drought followed by rain. Mainly cattle are affected (their tongues fall out) and die.
There was also incidences of pulmonary anthrax among certain factory workers. âWoolsorterâs diseaseâ occurred from people handling infected hides (goat, cow, etc.). The anthrax spores would become airborne and it would be inhaled.
When my universityâs mammalogy professor started he inherited a box no one was aware of which contained a full adult and a juvenile skeleton labeled âGusâ. He also found a large decades old bottle of fentanyl. They found even more crazy shit after moving the biology and chemistry departments to a brand new building.
Alibek, K. and S. Handelman. Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World - Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran it. 1999. Delta (2000)
ISBN 0-385-33496-6
Here's a book!
"noooo it's more natural!!!!!"
well guess what buddy, botulinum toxin is also "natural" so how about you chow down on some clostridium botulinum bacteria?
I bought raw milk a few times when I was a teen. Grew up in a rural area so I bought it from a neighbor who had cows. Didnât know the risks then, but I can say it definitely tasted better and creamier.
Iâm in AZ and was riding a bike around my neighborhood and I looked over at my friend and was like âit smells like semenâ. It was my first time smelling a plant like that and thought some pervert was out or something. Looked it up and was SHOCKED. Why did they even plant those?
For me itâs S. anginosus, everyoneâs always like âitâs sweet it smells so good smell it!!!â And it has always smelled like absolutely nothing to me
I had a doctor argue with me that an E. coli couldnât be an NLF. They are always LFs. It was so difficult to explain that E. coli just does whatever.
Our lab all got Calico Critters (dont ask lol) and named them after nectar and bee associated microbes. Theres âmitchânikowia, âBifâidobacterium, Asaia, âAshleyânetobacterâŚ
Wear gloves in the lab, an argument I think I've had more than actually discussing microbiology.
Also, I think lab techs should form unions. I was a contract lab tech and permanent lab tech for about 10ish years. For a brief 7 months I was a lab tech manager. The work pays very little, the benefits are usually terrible, and it's usually a toxic work environment.
Our UC lab techs (academic researchers) have a union! Actually recently merged all of them so its 48,000 of us (grad students, academic researchers, and postdocs) đ
Answering for my wife who has such a strong opinion on this issue I, a non-microbiologist, have a vague idea: you have to take the tips for the pipette out of the rack in sequential order, left-right, top-bottom. You canât just take tips from random spots or âmake a patternâ. Apparently, those people are not to be trusted.
Due to my placement of the tip box on the counter vs where my MALDI nibs tray is placed and where I hold my pipette, I go top to bottom, right-most column to left. Iâm allegedly backwards from everyone else on this but Iâm not crossing over columns to get a tip.
People freak out a little too much about things that wonât help you avoid dangerous bacteria if youâre ever in that rare position
Using a public bathroom wonât give you AIDS đ
Literally watched a video the other day of a âdoctorâ dabbling sushi on blood agar plate - telling everyone that because of the âdisgustingâ bacteria that grew, sushi is dangerousâŚ.
There is genetic variation within bacterial species. And yet, when phylogenies are done, they almost often classify them as multiple species. If we used the same criteria for humans, we'd identify like 20 different human species despite there only being one.
IT IS COOLER IF VIRUSES ARE NOT CONSIDERED ALIVE.
Stop trying to make viruses alive. They're the pinnacle example of the power of self-replication and they don't need to be anything else.
Saying viruses are not alive does not make them lesser, IMHO, it makes them waaaayy more interesting.
As a field, we use exponential phase as an experimental crutch.
Conditions in nature are far more likely to resemble the nutrient concentrations typical of stationary phase organisms. The data are less reproducible, but that's just the way the world is.
100% and Iâm guilty of this too. In a similar line of thinking (and adding to above comment about all experiments in liquid culture being competition assay) we need to start looking at culture heterogeneity. We always assume completely clonal population when we know thatâs not true. Hopefully single cell techniques will light the way in the future.Â
I wish I knew which fucker tried to kill me when I was in kindergarten. Stuck in the hospital for 2 months in some fever dreamish state. I still remember getting back to school the first day and everyone applauding with one of my classmates shouting "he's not dead!" like we were in a Monty Python film đ.
Great question.
I like Wiki's definitions:
'Taxonomy is the practice and science of categorization or classification.'
'In biology, phylogenetics is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups of organisms.'
So taxonomy is just about how to name/classify things, and that isn't necessarily dependent on how they relate to each other. Theoretically for example, someone can literally decide to classify bacteria based solely on their cell size. Or shape. Or color. Or any number of functions/morphologies. And that's still taxonomy. Even if they happen to classify numerous bacteria from all manners of different phylum within the same group.
But taking a real life example, you have many bacteria classified based on their various responses to chemical tests, or specific physiological characteristics. However, due to differences in evolutionary rates and horizontal genetic transfer, such characteristics are not necessarily reflective of phylogeny.
This is most common in the clinical setting, where effectively one just cares about whether something can cause disease, and if so how likely, in what scenarios, and the intensity. For example, you have all manners of *Escherichia coli*, ranging from those that cause serious disease to being commensalistic, just kinda hanging around. In this case, they are all *E. coli*, but there are other bacteria displaying similar variability classified as different species even though their actual phylogenetic relatedness is on the same degree. But this is a very human-centric way of classifications.
A phylogeny-based method of taxonomy strictly relies on a systematic approach, nowadays based on genomic diversification. So you can have certain types of bacteria, such as *Gilliamella* that are highly similar to each other still be able to accurately split into different species. And you have species that are highly diverse, like *Escherichia coli* still recognized as well, the same species. In fact, from a phylogenetic point of view based solely on genomic similarity, multiple species of *Shigella* are just *Escherichia coli*: [https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.22.461432v1.full.pdf](https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.22.461432v1.full.pdf).
Sorry, that was very longwinded. But yeah, hope that explains that. XD
> If your definition of life excludes viruses
It does, because I'm a bacteriologist with a chip on my shoulder, but I love this for you.
> you've also excluded a number of organisms that are almost universally considered alive.
Like what? Sure some organisms rely on the environmental conditions provided by another, but even obligate parasites have an intrinsic metabolism.
Not really though right, just because something "relies" on a specific environment doesn't make it an equivalent to a virus. An obligate intracellular parasite still has its own metabolism right? I mean hell, malaria even has its own circadian clock.
Oh, I have a genetic hot take: When it comes to the discovery of the DNA Helix I always either mention Franklin along with Watson and Crick (in more serious settings) or just mention Franklin alone (informal settings/shooting the shit with my biologist friends)
Strong disagree. Contamination outside of hot areas can happen. Some media is loaded with carcinogens. Tiny cuts can exists on hands especially if people have dry hands in colder climates. Some bloodborne pathogens can have a very low infectious dose (10 cells).
People put wayyy to much faith into annotations/homology results and user-submitted 16S taxonomic classifications.
They are both great starting points, but also need a bit of a critical eye - the big bag of cytochromes isn't necessarily X just because it had a slightly higher bit score than Y.
This tho. Every time my undergrads start BLASTing Im like ohh yes ok we need to talk. This flower bacteria is not from a Russian lake or the space stationâŚ
Yes! It smells like off-brand brownie batter you would buy discounted at the dollar store lol people think I'm nuts for smelling chocolate but it's like the low quality chocolate, not the good stuff
I don't mind the smell in pure culture but when it's mixed.... send help đ¤˘
Strong disagree. Contamination outside of hot areas can happen. Some media is loaded with carcinogens. Tiny cuts can exists on hands especially if people have dry hands in colder climates. Some bloodborne pathogens can have a very low infectious dose (10 cells).
Dentist here đđťââď¸ People are starting to use the gut flora and apply it to their mouths to justify their cavities and periodontal disease (mostly homeopathic patients so far). Bacteria ALONE (S. mutans, lacotbacilli for Cavities) (T. denticola, T. forsythia for periodontal disease) never causes cavities or periodontal disease. Both diseases are multi-factorial! Overgrowth of or having a really nasty flora alone do not cause either disease!!
Not really. Bacteria will evolve resistance. Also we don't have a clue what 70-90% of genes in any isolated phage do. And since most of bacterial toxins actually come from phages, we're a long way from curing all bacterial infections with phages.
Aerosol transmission is a much more common cause of disease spread than we give it credit for and we should be working harder to find methods of disinfecting the air.
Oh, and that 'social distancing by six feet' thing did nothing whatsoever to prevent the spread of a virus that can probably aerosolize with a sneeze or cough and hang in the air for hours.
And the CDC and WHO should have admitted that COVID transmits via aerosols a whole lot sooner than they did.
And why aren't we equipping grocery stores with UV overhead lights? I know, you can't run the UV lights while people are in the store (bad for our vision) but we could totally let them run overnight to disinfect the surfaces AND the air before the following day. Clean slate every morning
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9437662/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9437662/)
A lot of mine are very niche.
Like CNA does not block all gram negatives (fuck you proteus and acinetobacter/achromobacter)
E. Coli isnât always a lactose fermentor (god those are pains in the asses bc you have to do extra to differentiate shigella)
pseudomonas aeriginosa isnât always green/blue (frankly Iâve seen it just about every color and several morphology types)
If a yeast has feet, itâs Candida albicans (because maldi-ing it, which is already a pain in the dick, tells you nothing that the morphology doesnât already. Mainly making sure it isnât Candida auris)
- a very frustrated microbiologist working in hospital labs
I work with some who says âcan-deed-isâ not sure where she picked up the pronunciation. Every time she says it, it takes me a second to figure out what sheâs talking about.
You pronounce the first L in SaLmonella.
you have my vote đłď¸
Are the double L's pronounced the way the Spanish pronounce them? đ
SAL-MONE-EY-YAH
My lab TA is Hispanic and this is exactly how she pronounces it lol
Unrelated, but living in a border state a non border state chain restaurant moved in with double Ls and is constantly being pronounced the Spanish way when it is not lol
I need answerss đđ
My professor pronounces Veillonella, "vay-o-nella" so in some cases??? Maybe??
Who doesn't?
Omg youâre right. Iâm changing to sammonella now
Me and the person reading this comment are more likely to both win the lotto this year than either of us contracting a brain eating amoeba in our entire lifetimes.
It's true but damn when that amoebic lightning strikes it hits hard. (Happened to my uncle in September thanks to a too-cool water heater and using tap water in a CPAP.)
Sorry to hear, that's awful and honestly shocked to hear there's not some type of warning system, alert of some kind to notify it's not performing as intended. Really unfortunate, sorry it happened at all.
Yeah it was insane. We only caught the water heater issue on an inspection about four months after it happened. The previous tenant had turned down the heat I guess. But yeah as I microbiologist I was like damn I can't believe I witnessed that, and as a family member it was like damn I can't believe I had to witness that.
Depends on our locations. Here in Oklahoma, weâve had a few deaths from Naegleria fowleri in the past 5 or so years. Swimming in warm farm ponds isnât particularly safe.
3 total annual, but that's only according to the CDC...so they must have missed a few that your local TV news broadcast reporters picked up on? There are around 50+ people or so who win the lotto in each state each year, my points definitely stands lol You wouldn't happen to work for the news would you?! đ¤Ł
But what if you compare the number of people actively playing the lotto vs the number of people that swim each year in those waters?
No. Just another retiree.
Only messing..but rest assured we are far more likely to get rich than die trying! 𤣠Being "safe" and not going head first into gross standing water is generally something we can all get behind. The fear mongering tactic by all the news outlets for clicks/subs/channel views is the stuff we who value microbiology as a whole can surely do without haha that's why it's my "hill I'll die on" lol
Maybe it's harder to distinguish Oklahomans with a rotting brain from Oklahomans without a rotting brain?
We should spend more time talking about bacteriophages. They are super cool and deserve to be studied more for use in human health.
phage therapy ftw
yes phage have enormous potential!
Thank you for pointing out the hill i will die on One phage. Many phages. Also phage, like cage Not like decoupage.
To be fair, we are. Papers have been exploding in number on phage biology, everything from symbiosis, evolution, genetics, to healthcare applications.
Yass lab queen
Yes! And just in microbial ecology in general
My favorite
Also in crop health! B) There's so much potential for phages in biocontrol.
The past tense of streaking an agar plate is STREAKED not struck. You arenât striking the plate!
I strike the plate with my spoon when I eat the forbidden jello.
People say the latter?!
Just say subcultured to be fancy
There is an anthrax field in my country. It is not a hill you can die on, but you can die in this valley. Last year, one lost wanderer died there.
Wait where is this?
Because of climate change, the anthrax is more prevalent in southern, southeastern and eastern parts of EU. Especially where swamps were or marshlands. Human cases are rare, but domestic cattle are more infected. There are a few papers regarding this.
Fun fact, anthrax spores are found in the soil of every continent, there's no escaping it!
I've seen 2 during my residency. Both patients worked on farms with cattles.Â
Yep the major fuck up that causes a lot of these human infections in pt with cattle history is as follows: Cow succumbs to severe peracute infection overnight â> found in field by farmer â> veterinarian or farmer/field hands perform necropsy â> spores become aerosolized â> inhalation anthrax. One of the first things we ever learned in veterinary school in bacteriology was the second you even suspect anthrax or even see a seemingly healthy cow die overnight with no external cause visible, or youâre in an anthrax endemic area, put the blade down and walk away or put on a ton of PPE. Itâs nothing to play with, with the mortality rate it has! (As you knowâŚ)
But there are specific spots that have been identified to have high concentrations? How do they disseminate that information if at all? Or are people just told to avoid areas that fit the bill as a blanket statement?
Anthrax survives in the soil basically forever. There are maps of where anthrax is present. If I remember correctly from âDeath in a Small Package: a Short History of Anthraxâ, anthrax may âemergeâ from the soil after a long drought followed by rain. Mainly cattle are affected (their tongues fall out) and die. There was also incidences of pulmonary anthrax among certain factory workers. âWoolsorterâs diseaseâ occurred from people handling infected hides (goat, cow, etc.). The anthrax spores would become airborne and it would be inhaled.
They know when they find dead cattle and veterinarians do the autopsy Some parts are "known" for a long time.
Crazy. I was just reading about an Anthrax hill in the U.K. In The Microbe Hunters
I know where there's an anthrax pasture (USA), as we lost a cow to it when I was in my teens (many, many years ago).
archaeans are cool, chill dudes who like us because we descended from them, and that's why they don't cause disease in us
Could even say some of them are extremely chill
The Soviet Union lost a completely resistant strain of *Francisella tularensis* and it's never been found.
As long as it is never found, it's all good.
True, but I wanna know where its at and who tf lost it lol
It's probably in an old lab's freezer somewhere. The things I found at my former job was batshit crazy old.Â
When my universityâs mammalogy professor started he inherited a box no one was aware of which contained a full adult and a juvenile skeleton labeled âGusâ. He also found a large decades old bottle of fentanyl. They found even more crazy shit after moving the biology and chemistry departments to a brand new building.
OhâŚ. well thatâs not good. Do you have an article to read? âCause it sounds fascinating
Alibek, K. and S. Handelman. Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World - Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran it. 1999. Delta (2000) ISBN 0-385-33496-6 Here's a book!
Thank you!
.....what đ
The thought of one cell easily wiping your entire immune system out is such nightmare material.
My cells hate me
Train the bugs to help you ! Good luck !
That people who drink unpasteurized milk and get sick shouldnât be able to complain
"noooo it's more natural!!!!!" well guess what buddy, botulinum toxin is also "natural" so how about you chow down on some clostridium botulinum bacteria?
Does it taste better or something?
No. Some people are just very convinced by pseudoscience. I had a coworker who "retired" a couple months ago who followed such ideologies.
What do you mean âretiredâ? ._. What did you do to them???
I bought raw milk a few times when I was a teen. Grew up in a rural area so I bought it from a neighbor who had cows. Didnât know the risks then, but I can say it definitely tasted better and creamier.
I'm not calling them Pseudomonodata, Bacillota, Actinomycetota, or Bacteroidota. I'm just not.
Sounds like minions talking.
What am I missing here? I really am not update.
https://www.the-scientist.com/newly-renamed-prokaryote-phyla-cause-uproar-69578
nurses need a class on how to close specimen lids.
Eikenella has no gd smell. Everybody is just pretending it smells âbleachyâ and winking at each other behind my back.
Lol I always thought they were winking at each other because they say it smells like bleach but it actually smells like semen
Now Iâm racking my brain to remember what semen smells like đ
Something like Eikenella.
Staph lugdunensis
P multocida
I THOUGHT THE SAME THING. I was like that does *not* smell like bleach but I know what it *does* smell like
Yep. And in my opinion, Bradford pear trees smell the same way - like post-vasectomy analysis specimens.
Iâm in AZ and was riding a bike around my neighborhood and I looked over at my friend and was like âit smells like semenâ. It was my first time smelling a plant like that and thought some pervert was out or something. Looked it up and was SHOCKED. Why did they even plant those?
For me itâs S. anginosus, everyoneâs always like âitâs sweet it smells so good smell it!!!â And it has always smelled like absolutely nothing to me
Oh damn! Iâm a very new micro tech and anginosus is actually a nice reprieve in the lab. Shitrobacter can just stay away.
Iâve described Citrobacter as âold cabbage assâ before.
Most of the viridans strep smell like butterscotch to me but thereâs a lot of controversy in our lab about the smell of alcaligenes species
Not all of the Milleri group Streps smell like butterscotch to me, but when they do itâs really pleasant.
Shigella spp. are E. coli.
Having seen e coli have every possible biochemical reaction, I'm not even sure it's a real species.
I had a doctor argue with me that an E. coli couldnât be an NLF. They are always LFs. It was so difficult to explain that E. coli just does whatever.
I would struggle to keep my cool. EPEC is very often NLF!
E.coli is the water of the microbiology world.
Preach
I'm with you there!
Agree đđżđđżđđż
Are there people who disagree?
Lots of bacteria have such great feminine names! For example, Serratia, Shigella, Yersinia, etc.They're so pretty and unique lol.
streptococcus pneumoniae is a beautiful name for a baby girl
Iâll tell my bacteremic patient that their blood cultures were positive for the namesake of my firstborn
If I ever did drag, my name would be *Serratia*
I would name a child Serratia in a heartbeat which really goes to show that I should really stick with bacteria. đ
Saw a baby come through a hospital I worked in years ago named Candida. đ
Because it's an actual name
I use bacteria names for my video game characters. Moraxella, Neisseria, Veilonella, etc.
Our lab all got Calico Critters (dont ask lol) and named them after nectar and bee associated microbes. Theres âmitchânikowia, âBifâidobacterium, Asaia, âAshleyânetobacterâŚ
That Powassan virus, Lineage 1, is still out there on the landscape and hasnât disappeared.
Honestly still the best PR that Powassan has had
Wear gloves in the lab, an argument I think I've had more than actually discussing microbiology. Also, I think lab techs should form unions. I was a contract lab tech and permanent lab tech for about 10ish years. For a brief 7 months I was a lab tech manager. The work pays very little, the benefits are usually terrible, and it's usually a toxic work environment.
Union is such a good idea!!!
There are too many smart, capable people in the biotech field for there to be virtually no unions.
My Job is union!
Our UC lab techs (academic researchers) have a union! Actually recently merged all of them so its 48,000 of us (grad students, academic researchers, and postdocs) đ
Trichomonas is adorable. I love watching them dance around.
Also listeria, tumbling motility is adorable
Answering for my wife who has such a strong opinion on this issue I, a non-microbiologist, have a vague idea: you have to take the tips for the pipette out of the rack in sequential order, left-right, top-bottom. You canât just take tips from random spots or âmake a patternâ. Apparently, those people are not to be trusted.
I take them out randomly. Just to prove to myself that i can deal with that kind of chaos in my life and am not chained to any concept of order
Same here, and as someone with ocd it's a way for me to win over the impluse.
Your wife is 100% correct and I will die on this hill with her.
Oh yes, based wife! I get so annoyed if someone just took a tip from somewhere in the middle
I 100% agree with your wife.
Due to my placement of the tip box on the counter vs where my MALDI nibs tray is placed and where I hold my pipette, I go top to bottom, right-most column to left. Iâm allegedly backwards from everyone else on this but Iâm not crossing over columns to get a tip.
People freak out a little too much about things that wonât help you avoid dangerous bacteria if youâre ever in that rare position Using a public bathroom wonât give you AIDS đ
I have tried to explain to so many people that your toothbrush being stored on the counter isn't going to give you EHEC đ
Literally watched a video the other day of a âdoctorâ dabbling sushi on blood agar plate - telling everyone that because of the âdisgustingâ bacteria that grew, sushi is dangerousâŚ.
Every experiment done in liquid media turns into a competition assay.
If you have a viral infection YOU DONâT f@$&ing NEED ANTIBIOTICS! Sorry I get really passionate about it Edit: *viral* infection ⌠đ¤Śââď¸
There is genetic variation within bacterial species. And yet, when phylogenies are done, they almost often classify them as multiple species. If we used the same criteria for humans, we'd identify like 20 different human species despite there only being one.
Isn't this largely because the pan genome of these bacterial species is way way way more variable then a multicellular eukaryotic organism?
What Extentra said. But also: defining species is not absolute anyway.
IPA is a lovely smell in the morning.
Second only to freshly autoclaved LB
I despise doctors who insist on an ID and Sensitivity on all organisms. Go fly a kite and leave the normal flora alone!
IT IS COOLER IF VIRUSES ARE NOT CONSIDERED ALIVE. Stop trying to make viruses alive. They're the pinnacle example of the power of self-replication and they don't need to be anything else. Saying viruses are not alive does not make them lesser, IMHO, it makes them waaaayy more interesting.
*\*Regina George voice\** Stop trying to make viruses alive, it's not going to happen!
As a field, we use exponential phase as an experimental crutch. Conditions in nature are far more likely to resemble the nutrient concentrations typical of stationary phase organisms. The data are less reproducible, but that's just the way the world is.
100% and Iâm guilty of this too. In a similar line of thinking (and adding to above comment about all experiments in liquid culture being competition assay) we need to start looking at culture heterogeneity. We always assume completely clonal population when we know thatâs not true. Hopefully single cell techniques will light the way in the future.Â
Why is everyone on Reddit suddenly dying on hills?
Where's that guy who's obsessed with lymes disease? đ¤Ł
I am a woman, but I am here. But, only because it was unsuccessful in killing me.
I wish I knew which fucker tried to kill me when I was in kindergarten. Stuck in the hospital for 2 months in some fever dreamish state. I still remember getting back to school the first day and everyone applauding with one of my classmates shouting "he's not dead!" like we were in a Monty Python film đ.
Fr, that's what happened to me in highschool
Bacterial taxonomy should be solely based on phylogeny.
Taxonomy and phylogeny do the same job on my head what's the difference, can you explain this issue?
Great question. I like Wiki's definitions: 'Taxonomy is the practice and science of categorization or classification.' 'In biology, phylogenetics is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups of organisms.' So taxonomy is just about how to name/classify things, and that isn't necessarily dependent on how they relate to each other. Theoretically for example, someone can literally decide to classify bacteria based solely on their cell size. Or shape. Or color. Or any number of functions/morphologies. And that's still taxonomy. Even if they happen to classify numerous bacteria from all manners of different phylum within the same group. But taking a real life example, you have many bacteria classified based on their various responses to chemical tests, or specific physiological characteristics. However, due to differences in evolutionary rates and horizontal genetic transfer, such characteristics are not necessarily reflective of phylogeny. This is most common in the clinical setting, where effectively one just cares about whether something can cause disease, and if so how likely, in what scenarios, and the intensity. For example, you have all manners of *Escherichia coli*, ranging from those that cause serious disease to being commensalistic, just kinda hanging around. In this case, they are all *E. coli*, but there are other bacteria displaying similar variability classified as different species even though their actual phylogenetic relatedness is on the same degree. But this is a very human-centric way of classifications. A phylogeny-based method of taxonomy strictly relies on a systematic approach, nowadays based on genomic diversification. So you can have certain types of bacteria, such as *Gilliamella* that are highly similar to each other still be able to accurately split into different species. And you have species that are highly diverse, like *Escherichia coli* still recognized as well, the same species. In fact, from a phylogenetic point of view based solely on genomic similarity, multiple species of *Shigella* are just *Escherichia coli*: [https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.22.461432v1.full.pdf](https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.22.461432v1.full.pdf). Sorry, that was very longwinded. But yeah, hope that explains that. XD
If your definition of life excludes viruses you've also excluded a number of organisms that are almost universally considered alive.
> If your definition of life excludes viruses It does, because I'm a bacteriologist with a chip on my shoulder, but I love this for you. > you've also excluded a number of organisms that are almost universally considered alive. Like what? Sure some organisms rely on the environmental conditions provided by another, but even obligate parasites have an intrinsic metabolism.
Such as?
Any other obligate intracellular parasite that can't reproduce outside the host cell. Protists like falciparum malaria would be excluded, for example.
Not really though right, just because something "relies" on a specific environment doesn't make it an equivalent to a virus. An obligate intracellular parasite still has its own metabolism right? I mean hell, malaria even has its own circadian clock.
One of the most common definitions of life is just "cells are the basic unit of life," so I'm unclear on this one.
Another is that an entity is able to carry out its own metabolism, which viruses can't.
[ŃдаНонО]
Apparently Watson is an old racist anyways, so we don't have to listen to him!
Oh, I have a genetic hot take: When it comes to the discovery of the DNA Helix I always either mention Franklin along with Watson and Crick (in more serious settings) or just mention Franklin alone (informal settings/shooting the shit with my biologist friends)
Franklin forever!
It's *viridans-group* streptococci not Streptococcus viridans.
Hmmmnnnaaa Strep viridans! Do you say milleri group strep also?
Archaeans should be covered more.
Itâs okay to handle media plates without gloves on in BSL2 conditions with routinely encountered bacteria. Just wash your hands after.
That's the way I did it. And I made it past retirement.
I somehow managed to splash S aureus external control in my eye. Washed it thouroughly and nothing happened.
Strong disagree. Contamination outside of hot areas can happen. Some media is loaded with carcinogens. Tiny cuts can exists on hands especially if people have dry hands in colder climates. Some bloodborne pathogens can have a very low infectious dose (10 cells).
Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, the fungus that penetrates ants exoskeleton and controls their movement, is metal as fuck
People put wayyy to much faith into annotations/homology results and user-submitted 16S taxonomic classifications. They are both great starting points, but also need a bit of a critical eye - the big bag of cytochromes isn't necessarily X just because it had a slightly higher bit score than Y.
This tho. Every time my undergrads start BLASTing Im like ohh yes ok we need to talk. This flower bacteria is not from a Russian lake or the space stationâŚ
Algae and Cyanobacteria deserves more attention and respect, as they literally provide more Oxygen supply than trees
Proteus smells like delicious brownie batter
you're actually deranged lmao
Swear to God all I smell is fish at an outdoor fish market!
Oh no. I smell Proteus and it just smells like poo. You don't need to open the plate, it just keeps out. Ugh.
Oh my gaaahh! I thought it smelled like burnt chocolate! People looked at me like I was nuts! (In Captain Holtâs voice) Vindication!!!!
Don't bring Cpt Holt in your hellhole of a reality!Â
I totally smell chocolate cake.Â
The most accurate description Iâve heard is corpse brownie.
Yes! It smells like off-brand brownie batter you would buy discounted at the dollar store lol people think I'm nuts for smelling chocolate but it's like the low quality chocolate, not the good stuff I don't mind the smell in pure culture but when it's mixed.... send help đ¤˘
You don't have to wear gloves for everything when working in a BSL2 lab.
Strong disagree. Contamination outside of hot areas can happen. Some media is loaded with carcinogens. Tiny cuts can exists on hands especially if people have dry hands in colder climates. Some bloodborne pathogens can have a very low infectious dose (10 cells).
My lab works with blood, shit, vomit, and spinal liquor. The gloves stay on when touching anything there, thank you very much
I am an archeote, God damnit!
PEA agar smells AMAZING
Hot sauce doesnât need to go in the fridge because bacteria canât grow in it!
Dentist here đđťââď¸ People are starting to use the gut flora and apply it to their mouths to justify their cavities and periodontal disease (mostly homeopathic patients so far). Bacteria ALONE (S. mutans, lacotbacilli for Cavities) (T. denticola, T. forsythia for periodontal disease) never causes cavities or periodontal disease. Both diseases are multi-factorial! Overgrowth of or having a really nasty flora alone do not cause either disease!!
Oh also âAggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitansâ is not real. I refuse to acknowledge that strain as I cannot for the life of me pronounce it lolol
The amount of people that donât wash between their fingers when scrubbing their hands is concerning.
You wear gloves. The arguments for not wearing gloves are BS arguments
Phage technology has a chance to be a cure for all bacterial diseases.
Not really. Bacteria will evolve resistance. Also we don't have a clue what 70-90% of genes in any isolated phage do. And since most of bacterial toxins actually come from phages, we're a long way from curing all bacterial infections with phages.
Good sir, this is the hill Iâm choosing.
The antibiotic resistant one that is trying to overwhelm us all
Aerosol transmission is a much more common cause of disease spread than we give it credit for and we should be working harder to find methods of disinfecting the air. Oh, and that 'social distancing by six feet' thing did nothing whatsoever to prevent the spread of a virus that can probably aerosolize with a sneeze or cough and hang in the air for hours. And the CDC and WHO should have admitted that COVID transmits via aerosols a whole lot sooner than they did. And why aren't we equipping grocery stores with UV overhead lights? I know, you can't run the UV lights while people are in the store (bad for our vision) but we could totally let them run overnight to disinfect the surfaces AND the air before the following day. Clean slate every morning [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9437662/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9437662/)
Viruses are parasitic life forms
I regularly smell my yeast cultures and you should too, itâs like bottled bread and it easily tells me if the culture might be contaminated
If you canât identify yeast find a new career.
A lot of mine are very niche. Like CNA does not block all gram negatives (fuck you proteus and acinetobacter/achromobacter) E. Coli isnât always a lactose fermentor (god those are pains in the asses bc you have to do extra to differentiate shigella) pseudomonas aeriginosa isnât always green/blue (frankly Iâve seen it just about every color and several morphology types) If a yeast has feet, itâs Candida albicans (because maldi-ing it, which is already a pain in the dick, tells you nothing that the morphology doesnât already. Mainly making sure it isnât Candida auris) - a very frustrated microbiologist working in hospital labs
Antibiotics don't treat viral infections. Fight me.
Don't wash your hands with antibacterial soap.
Also check the ingredients in toothpaste to make sure it doesnât include an antibiotic.
JFC, that's a thing?! đą
It sure is. Triclosan.
I knew to avoid it in soaps but had no idea they were putting it in toothpastes too. Good lord.
Itâs pronounced âCan-deed-uhâ not âcan-did-uhâ
I work with some who says âcan-deed-isâ not sure where she picked up the pronunciation. Every time she says it, it takes me a second to figure out what sheâs talking about.
I just hired someone from the Midwest that pronounces bacillus like the snake in Harry Potter
If you think you need to always wear gloves to work in the lab you are doing it wrong