This Week in Microbiology

Vincent, Michael, Elio, and Joe review highlights of the 15th International Symposium on Staphylococci and Staphylococcal Infections (ISSSI) in Lyon, France.

Vincent and Michael travel to San Francisco for the 52nd Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy (ICAAC), where they meet with Bill, John, and Victor to discuss tuberculosis, monitoring infectious disease outbreaks with online data, and outside-the-box approaches to antibacterial therapy.

**MicrobeWorld app users, click the "e" symbol in the bottom right corner of this description to watch a bonus video version of this episode!** Vincent and Stanley meet with Waclaw Szybalski and John Kirby at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on the occasion of its designation as a Milestones in Microbiology site. They reminisce about how the well known laboratory has advanced the science and teaching...

Vincent, Michael, and Elio reviews chapters from Microbes and Evolution , a collection of short, personal essays by microbiologists.

Vincent, Jo, Michael, and Elio review an outbreak of pertussis in Washington, and how culturing can reveal rare members of the soil biosphere.

Vincent, Jo, Michael, and Elio discuss two examples of dynamic microbial symbioses that switch between mutualistic and pathogenic states.

Vincent, Michael, and Elio explore the origin of Mycoplasma pathogens of ruminants, and share their thoughts on the recent ASM General Meeting.

Vincent, Michael, and Elio review necrotizing fasciitis, and a link between surface remodeling in gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.

Hosts:  Vincent Racaniello ,  Michael Schmidt ,  and  Elio Schaechter Vincent, Michael, and Elio discuss changing populations of  Emiliania huxleyi  and their viruses in the North and Black Seas. Right click to download  TWiM #34  (50 MB .mp3, 69 minutes). Links for this episode: The  protist wonderland  (Microbe) Emiliania huxleyi   home page DISCO in the North Sea  (FEMS Microbiol Ecol) 7000 yea...

Vincent, Michael, and Ivo review the requirement for segmented, filamentous bacteria for the induction of a specific type of helper T cell in the gut. Links for this episode: Induction of Th17 cells  by segmented filamentous bacteria (Cell) Segmented filamentous bacteria  take the stage (Nature) Genome of segmented filamentous bacteria  reveals auxotrophy  (Cell) Segmented filamentous bacteria and...

Rosie Redfield talks about her evidence that a bacterium cannot grow on arsenic instead of phosphorus. 

Hosts:  Vincent Racaniello ,  Jo Handelsman ,  and   Michael Schmidt Vincent, Jo, and Michael discuss an archetypal protein transport system in bacterial outer membranes, and evidence that gut microbial enterotypes might not fall into defined groups. Links for this episode: Discovery of a TAM, a new bacterial  protein transport system  (Nat Struct Mol Biol) Commentary  on TAM discovery Enterotypes...

On episode #30 of the podcast, Vincent, Elio, and Michael review how a toxin from Burkholderia pseudomallei inhibits protein synthesis, and the role of the gut microbiome in modulating insulin resistance in mice lacking an innate immune sensor.

On episode #29 of the podcast,  Vincent  and Stanley review how a phage pierces the cell membrane with an iron-loaded spike, and two programmed cell death systems in E. coli.

Vincent, Michael, and Elio review how competition within a host drives virulence of Streptococcus pneumoniae , and the expanding universe of the bacterial cytoskeleton.

Vincent, Elio, and Michael review how inflammation allows Salmonella to compete with fermenting gut microbes, and a riboswitch in bacterial and Archeal species that is triggered by fluoride.

Vincent, Elio, and Michael discuss the finding of Sutterella species in the gut of autistic children, and methods for cultivating oral bacteria. 

On episode #25 of the podcast, Vincent, Elio, and Michael review bacteria that use the earth’s magnetic field for navigation, and identification of totally drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

Vincent, Michael, and Cliff review ten compelling microbiology stories from 2011.

Vincent, Jo, Elio, and Michael explain how a swarming bacterium helps disperse a non-motile fungus, and bacterial antibiotic tolerance mediated by hydrogen sulfide and starvation responses.

Vincent and Michael speak with Alfred Sacchetti, MD, Chief of Emergency Services at Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center, about microbial infections encountered in the emergency room.

Vincent and Elio discuss ancient symbiosis between Alphaproteobacteria and catenulid flatworms, and a toxin from Helicobacter pylori that engages the mitochondrial fission machinery to induce host cell death.

On episode #20 of the podcast   This Week in Microbiology ,  Vincent, Michael, and Elio follow up on the outbreaks of  E. coli  in Germany and cholera in Haiti, then discuss genes that confer self-identity to  Proteus  mirabilis .

Vincent, Michael, Elio, and Jo discuss the genome sequence of Y. pestis from victims of the Black Death, and the effect of diet on gut microbial enterotypes.

Vincent, Michael, Elio, and Stanley explain how to make the human intestinal commensal and benign laboratory bacterium Escherichia coli K-12 into an invasive organism, and the unearthing of century-old spores in New York City.