As well as the joy that comes with swimming, there can also be some dirty risks.
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Articles on Microbes
Displaying 1 - 20 of 148 articles
Our Mars rovers might not be sensitive enough to detect signs of life. But lessons from Antarctica might make future missions more successful.
Fossil evidence of how the earliest life on Earth came to be is hard to come by. But scientists have come up with a few theories based on the microbes, viruses and prions existing today.
Some scientists believe that the placenta and amniotic fluid that surrounds a foetus have their own microbiome. A new review refutes this.
Microbes are so tiny humans can’t see them without special equipment. But the discovery of 20 new species will help scientists map the evolutionary tree of life.
The walls of your house could someday be built with living bacteria. Synthetic biologists are engineering microbes into living materials that are cheap and sustainable.
Don’t let microbes and insects turn your Halloween masterpiece into a horror show before the big night.
Termites are about to experience a significant global expansion in their prime habitat, thanks to climate change. Here’s what that means for deadwood.
Antimicrobial resistance is a growing threat. Here’s how resistant genes sneak into human guts via wastewater, food and other routes.
People wouldn’t last long without the countless other species we depend on for survival.
Listeria causes serious illness and food recalls nearly every year.
The types of microbes residing in your gut can affect your mental and physical health. Home microbiome tests promise to help consumers improve the composition of their gut microbes.
Current expiration date system leads to confused consumers and wasted food.
Plastic is made from oil and natural gas, which started out as fossilized plant and animal material. But buried deep underground for millions of years, those materials changed in important ways.
Toe jam was mentioned in a song by The Beatles. Maybe they knew a thing or two about foot hygiene.
Ground is collapsing and massive lakes are draining in a matter of days. Thawing permafrost is having profound effects on the region and its infrastructure.
Plants communicate with the fungi on their roots, but the effects on the ecosystem of deliberately adding fungi as a fertilizer are unknown — and might be harmful.
In ancient Earth’s atmosphere, microbes called acetogens were able to recycle carbon dioxide using chemical energy sources such as hydrogen.
Air-ventilation upgrades have been badly needed in U.S. classrooms since long before the pandemic. Low-tech filtration systems that cost about the same as a textbook per student can make a big difference.
We can fine-tune bacteria using algorithms to help them produce the things we need, from antibiotics to methane.
Top contributors
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Professor of Planetary Geosciences, The Open University
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Doctoral Candidate in Microbiology, University of Oregon
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Assistant Professor, Department of Entomology; African-American Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
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Professor emeritus, Colorado State University
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Senior Lecturer in Geology, University of Aberdeen
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Senior Lecturer in Pharmaceutical Sciences, RMIT University
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Australian Research Council Future Fellow, The University of Western Australia
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Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Washington State University
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Senior Lecturer in Earth System Science, University of Hull
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Professor of microbiology, Manchester Metropolitan University
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Senior Lecturer in Biology, Brunel University London
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Professor of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, McMaster University
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Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology, Indiana University
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Assistant Professor of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, University of Maine
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Ecologist and Researcher, Flinders University
