When people hear the name E. coli, even a passing familiarity brings about reactions of disgust and fear of food poisoning. This outright hatred of the common bacteria is, perhaps, a bit unwarr...
http://blogs.dnalc.org/2012/03/05/just-a-cluck-away-from-e-coli/
Complex social behavior was considered to be unique in animals, especially humans. Now with recent findings, we may need to extend this ability to plants. The old wives tale, “if you talk...
http://blogs.dnalc.org/2012/01/04/be-nice-to-your-plants-they-might-be-sensing-you/
While scientists have long known that carriers for Sickle Cell Trait are more resistant to Malaria infection, the mechanism by which protection is conferred has not been well understood—until n...
Before the dawn of the written language, prehistoric humans began recording events from their daily lives and environment on the walls of their local caves. Now many of these cave paintings are...
Butterflies are a timeless symbol of beauty and serenity, with their sweet graceful fluttering is enjoyed by people around the globe. But to “non-people,” or hungry animals, they are more o...
http://blogs.dnalc.org/2011/11/08/the-secrets-of-butterflies/
Back in February, I blogged about a patient who received a bone marrow transplant, from an HIV-immune donor, that cured both his leukemia and AIDS. I mentioned that while bone marrow transplant...
Who would have known that a little glowing jellyfish would come to mean so much? In the 60’s and 70’s a Japanese scientist named Osamu Shimomura isolated a protein from the pacific jellyfis...
http://blogs.dnalc.org/2011/10/05/glow-kitties-for-disease-resistance/
Recently I worked with a group of graduate students who volunteered to be science mentors for students in New York City. They were being trained in a small set of hands-on labs designed to in...
Scientists at the Universities of Nottingham and Maastricht have engineered a strain of bacteria that may be able to fight cancer! Clostridium sporogenes are anaerobic soil dwellers which cannot ...
Science experiments are not usually meant to be eaten; even water and gum are strictly banned from laboratories. But as scientists continue to perfect techniques for genetic manipulation, the p...