Microbes

Food contaminated with fungi can be an inconvenience at best and life-threatening at worst. But new research shows that removing just one protein can leave some fungal toxins high and dry, and that’s potentially good news for food safety. Some fungi produce toxic chemicals called mycotoxins that not only spoil food such as grains but…

The V-1302 John Mahn has sat at the bottom of the North Sea off Belgium for decades. The ship began its life in Germany as a 48-meter-long fishing vessel. However, during the Second World War, the Nazi Kriegsmarine requisitioned it for use as a patrol boat. On February 12, 1942, a squadron of six British…

Bacteria go to extremes to handle hard times: They hunker down, building a fortress-like shell around their DNA and turning off all signs of life. And yet, when times improve, these dormant spores can rise from the seeming dead. But “you gotta be careful when you decide to come back to life,” says Peter Setlow,…

The Hidden Kingdom of FungiKeith SeifertGreystone Books, $27.95 Take a walk through the woods after it rains, and you can catch a glimpse of the incredible diversity of fungi. You might spot the real-life version of the red-and-white “power-up” mushroom from the video game Super Mario Bros. or the aptly named dead man’s fingers, a…

There’s a new record holder for biggest bacterium — and you don’t need a microscope to see it. The newfound species, Thiomargarita magnifica, is roughly a centimeter long, and its cells are surprisingly complex, researchers report in the June 24 Science. The bacterial behemoth is roughly the size and shape of a human eyelash, marine…

Yagi Studio | Getty Images Since the first factories began manufacturing polyester from petroleum in the 1950s, humans have produced an estimated 9.1 billion tons of plastic. Of the waste generated from that plastic, less than a tenth of that has been recycled, researchers estimate. About 12 percent has been incinerated, releasing dioxins and other…

Some bacteria carry tiny syringes filled with chemicals that may thin out competitors or incapacitate predators. Now, researchers have gotten up-close views of these syringes, technically known as contractile injection systems, from a type of cyanobacteria and a marine bacterium. Figuring out how key parts of the molecular syringes work may help scientists devise their…

Chain mail–like armor may help keep one superbug safe from bacteria-killing medicines. Clostridioides difficile bacteria are notorious for taking over the guts of people who have taken antibiotics to treat other infections. If the antibiotic clears out too many good bacteria, the loss can throw the gut’s microbial system out of whack and allow diarrhea-causing…

Beneath the prickly spines of European hedgehogs, a microbial standoff may have bred a dangerous drug-resistant pathogen long before the era of antibiotic use in humans. It’s no question that antibiotic use accelerates drug-resistance in bacteria that colonize humans, says Jesper Larsen, a veterinarian at Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen. But, he says, these microbes…

When some bacteria manage to escape being killed by a virus, the microbes end up hamstringing themselves. And that could be useful in the fight to treat infections. The bacterium Shigella flexneri — one cause of the infectious disease shigellosis — can spread within cells that line the gut by propelling itself through the cells’…