Amidst the November/December holiday chaos, myself and co-authors were proud to witness the publication of a neat new paper focused on ATM keypads in New York City. Yes, just like all other surfaces in the Built Environment, those ATM keypads are harboring lots of microbes and bits of orphaned DNA! This ATM keypad study was work that …
Why did I seek to put Green BIM into Room 101 ? Did I not tweet only this week that Green BIM is one of the more important developments in the built environment? The label, or hashtag for GreenBIM is so riddled with issues, I was only able to skim during the 2 mins allowed in …
The Microbiology of the Built Environment Network (http://microBE.net – this website) has made it into the community page at PLoS Biology! Our article has been in the works for some time, and we’re now pleased to announce its official publication: Bik HM, Coil DA, Eisen JA (2014) microBEnet: Lessons Learned from Building an Interdisciplinary Scientific Community …
I’ve been remotely following the Sloan MBE meeting discussions (happening in Boulder, CO this week), and yesterday there was a lot of Twitter discussion focused on data visualization tools. How do we make sense of the millions of DNA sequences we generate from microbial ecology projects in the Built Environment? I thought I’d use this opportunity to highlight …
Having been camped out in Portland, OR this week to speak at the 2014 Joint Aquatic Sciences Meeting, I woke up this morning to find a “boil water alert” had been issued for the entire city. Repeated testing over the last few days has found fecal contamination (E. coli) in the city’s reservoirs. So that means a lockdown …
Just got an e-mail about a new postdoc opportunity at NC State – contact details are listed below for anyone interested in applying: DATE: Position available immediately (November, 2013). SALARY: Commensurate with training and experience. APPOINTMENT: 100% research RESPONSIBILITIES: To conduct research on the relationships between cockroach and bed bug infestations and the microbial communities in infested homes. This …
As a yoga devotee and general fitness fanatic, I often use communal exercise equipment when I’m traveling or unexpectedly drop into a class after work. I’ve been wondering lately about scientific studies specifically looking at surfaces such as yoga mats, but after a quick literature search it seems that knowledge is thin in this area. …
This new paper might fall under the category of “things you don’t want to think about.” After reading this study by Buse et al., I now ponder what’s in my drinking water every time I fill up a glass from the tap: Buse HY, Lu J, Struewing IT, Ashbolt NJ. (2013) Eukaryotic diversity in premise …
Part of what we’re trying to do on this site is to put the net in microBEnet. As in, building an online network for an emerging research discipline (Microbiology of the Built Environment) that connects building scientists and engineers with biologists, ecologists and computer scientists. The internet is a big place. Publicizing a new cause or web …
For those wanting to catch up on the workshop discussions that happened last week in Boulder, we’ve pulled together all the tweets into a Storify! Includes coverage of the QIIME/VAMPS bioinformatics workshop, and the subsequent fungal meeting focused on resources for ITS gene barcoding. [View the story “QIIME/VAMPS and ITS fungi #microbenet meetings” on Storify]