Libsyn Directory

466: Microbes Mining Mars Minerals

Release Date: 12/06/2021

BacterioFiles

This episode: A virus partners with a parasitoid wasp to help exploit fruit fly victims! (7.7 MB, 11.2 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Actinomadura livida Takeaways Parasitoid wasps have an interesting lifestyle: they inject their eggs into the larvae of other insects, and their young hatch and grow up by consuming the host from the inside. Some of these wasps also inject a virus along with the egg, which supports the wasp offspring by suppressing the host immune system. Most of these parasitoid helper viruses are integrated into the host wasp genome and are translated and...

489: Soil Smell Synthesis Significance

BacterioFiles

This episode: Many organisms produce the smell of earth, geosmin, and many others can sense it–but why? (6.0 MB, 8.7 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Takeaways The smell of soil or earth is one of the most recognizable smells, and comes largely from a chemical called geosmin, produced by many different kinds of bacteria. Many animal species are sensitive to geosmin, some attracted by it and others repelled. But it is still not entirely understood what is the evolutionary benefit to the microbes that produce it, or the reason why different animals are...

488: Social Slimes Synchronize Sorties

BacterioFiles

This episode: Slime mold amoebas Fonticula alba have interesting and unique foraging and reproductive behaviors! (7.3 MB, 10.6 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Takeaways How did life develop from single-celled organisms acting independently into the complex, multicellular organisms we see and are today? Although it is difficult to look back through time to study how ancient organisms may have developed along this path, it is possible to investigate modern organisms that occupy a zone in between single-celled and multicellular, to see if we can get some hints to our...

487: Probiotic Pulverizes Pathogen Persisters

BacterioFiles

This episode: A probiotic strain of E. coli can target and destroy pathogens that survive a treatment of antibiotics! (8.2 MB, 12 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Streptomyces griseoruber Takeaways Antibiotic resistance is becoming more and more of a problem as bacterial pathogens develop resistance to more and more drugs. For some people who develop an infection that is resistant to everything, it's as if they were living back in the days before antibiotics were discovered, when all they could do was pray for survival. New antibiotics are needed, but even more needed...

486: Biohybrid Bacteria Build Biomass

BacterioFiles

This episode: Incorporating light-absorbing molecules into bacterial membranes can allow bacteria to use solar energy to transform nitrogen gas into fertilizer! (6.5 MB, 9.9 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Wheat dwarf virus Takeaways Turning nitrogen gas into biologically useful compounds, such as protein or ammonia for fertilizer, is an essential part of the global nitrogen cycle and therefore, for agriculture. Today much fertilizer is produced from nitrogen gas by a chemical process that requires large amounts of energy, contributing to global warming. But certain...

485: Small Cell Sculpts Sticky Snot Sphere

BacterioFiles

This episode: A marine protist predator traps prey microbes in an attractive bubble of mucus, eats what it wants, and lets the rest sink, possibly sequestering significant amounts of carbon! (7.8 MB, 11.4 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Bat associated cyclovirus 1 Takeaways The oceans have a lot of unique, unexplored life in them. This is true on a macro level but even more on a microscopic level, with many different kinds of microbes of various groups with fascinating life strategies. And despite being microscopic, with enough of them around, they can affect the whole...

484: Bacteriophages Boost Brains

BacterioFiles

This episode: Certain phages in the gut are linked with increases in performance on some cognitive tests! (7.5 MB, 10.9 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Streptomyces bikiniensis Takeaways Our gut microbiota includes a large number of viruses, mostly bacteriophages. These fall into two groups, the lytic kind that infects and reproduces itself immediately in a host, and the lysogenic kind that can integrate its genome into the host bacterial genome and remain dormant for long periods. In this study, a higher proportion of lysogenic phages was correlated with increased...

483: Recycling Resources Raises Robustness

BacterioFiles

This episode: Adding tags to proteins to increase their degradation can help engineered bacteria grow and survive better under various conditions! (7.3 MB, 10.4 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Lactococcus virus sk1 Takeaways Engineering bacteria with new genetic pathways allows us to use them in many new and promising applications. Some of these are industrial fermentations, growing large quantities of bacteria to use as catalysts for production of chemicals of interest, such as biofuels. But in other cases, engineered microbes can be most useful in less controlled...

482: Colony Concentric Clock Construction

BacterioFiles

This episode: Single-celled bacteria can act independently to create patterns and structure in their biofilm communities! (9.6 MB, 14.0 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Dictyostelium discoideum Skipper virus Takeaways Large multicellular organisms like us have interesting mechanisms for using one set of genetic instructions present in all cells to form a large, complex community of many different types of cells with different structures and functions, all working together. Single-celled microbes do not have the same requirements for genetic or structural complexity, but...

481: Hijacker-Host Sequence Swap

BacterioFiles

This episode: Gene transfers between viruses and eukaryotes have happened many times throughout evolutionary history! (7.5 MB, 10.9 minutes) Show notes: Microbe of the episode: Mycoplasma subdolum Takeaways As we’ve all seen recently, viruses can cause a lot of trouble. Their biology requires them to be parasites inside the cells of their hosts, and they can cause devastating disease, so it’s hard to think of them as having played important roles in the development of life on Earth, including our own evolution. However, this study found thousands of apparent historical...

More Episodes

This episode: Bacteria are able to extract metals from rocks for industrial use, even in microgravity!

Download Episode (6.2 MB, 9.0 minutes)

Show notes:
Microbe of the episode: Decapod ambidensovirus 1

News item

Takeaways

As humanity makes progress toward becoming an interplanetary species, consideration is needed on how travelers can survive and thrive in distant places. These methods may look very different from what works well on Earth, with differences in gravity, atmosphere, and access to resources. For example, mining for materials for construction may not be feasible using methods common on Earth. An alternative may be biomining, using microbes that can selectively extract and purify specific metals from minerals.

In this study, the European Space Agency tested the ability of several microbes to extract vanadium from rocks in different gravity conditions, on the International Space Station. Two out of three microbes were able to extract twice as much vanadium as was extracted in the absence of microbes, both on a planet and up in space.

Journal Paper:
Cockell CS, Santomartino R, Finster K, Waajen AC, Nicholson N, Loudon C-M, Eades LJ, Moeller R, Rettberg P, Fuchs FM, Van Houdt R, Leys N, Coninx I, Hatton J, Parmitano L, Krause J, Koehler A, Caplin N, Zuijderduijn L, Mariani A, Pellari S, Carubia F, Luciani G, Balsamo M, Zolesi V, Ochoa J, Sen P, Watt JAJ, Doswald-Winkler J, Herová M, Rattenbacher B, Wadsworth J, Everroad RC, Demets R. 2021. Microbially-Enhanced Vanadium Mining and Bioremediation Under Micro- and Mars Gravity on the International Space Station. Front Microbiol 12:663.

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