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Bacterial biofilms, slimy collections of microbes, can develop concentric rings containing cells with different biological features Life 6 January 2022 By Alex Wilkins Bacillus subtilis, a soil bacterium, can create concentric rings when it forms a biofilm Kwang-Tao Chou Bacterial biofilms contain a level of structural organisation that we thought was unique to plants and … Read more
An evolutionary battle between fungi and bacteria on hedgehogs’ skin gave rise to a type of antibiotic-resistant bacteria long before humans started using the antibiotics that were thought to lead to such superbugs, a new study reveals. Researchers traced some lineages of the superbug MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, to a parasitic fungus found … Read more
A strain of the antibiotic-resistant bacterium MRSA seems to have colonised the skin of hedgehogs more than 200 years ago – and many other similarly evasive bugs might exist in nature Life 5 January 2022 By Jessica Hamzelou A European hedgehog Coatesy/Shutterstock A strain of the antibiotic-resistant bacterium MRSA seems to have evolved in hedgehogs … Read more
A sugar additive used in several foods could have helped spread a seriously dangerous superbug around the US, according to a 2018 study. The finger of blame is pointed squarely at the sugar trehalose, found in foods such as nutrition bars and chewing gum. If the findings are confirmed, it’s a stark warning that … Read more
Copper is well known for being able to kill off bacteria that it comes into contact with – the metal releases ions that are toxic to bacterial cells, punching through their outer membranes. However, this process usually takes several hours. A newly developed copper surface does the job in just a couple of minutes, … Read more
The line between art and science is sometimes a swirly one. Researchers studying a social bacterium that moves and feeds in coordinated swarms have unintentionally recreated something that looks a lot like a familiar masterpiece. When a certain gene is overexpressed in a bacterium known as Myxococcus xanthus, the individual organisms self-organize into tiny circular … Read more