We are not alone at ASM 2014

A group of us from Jonathan Eisen’s lab attended the General Meeting for the American Society for Microbiology (ASM) last month in Boston. A major highlight of the conference was “We Are Not Alone: Microbial Revelations of the Built Environment,” a symposium that was organized by the Junior Advisory Group that is made up of postdocs and …

Another genome from an uncultured microbe from a hospital sink biofilm #JCVI #Porphyromonas

Just wrote a post a few minutes ago about the sequencing and analysis of the genome(s) of representatives of the TM6 phylum of bacteria that were found in a hospital sink biofilm: First genome of TM6 — a novel phylum of bacteria — determined from a hospital sink sample. And lo and behold just realized there …

First genome of TM6 – a novel phylum of bacteria – determined from a hospital sink sample

Interesting new paper out from the J. Craig Venter Institute.  The paper is in PNAS: Candidate phylum TM6 genome recovered from a hospital sink biofilm provides genomic insights into this uncultivated phylum.  Thankfully it was published under the PNAS Open Access option so anyone / everyone has access to the paper.  In the paper the authors …

Adapting Standards: Ethical Oversight of Participant-Led Health Research

Just out in today’s edition of PLoS Medicine: Adapting Standards: Ethical Oversight of Participant-Led Health Research. The article raises questions (in my mind) about the ethics related to human genome sequencing projects. We ask, what is “informed consent” when you have your genome sequence published? What about your children’s interests, your siblings’, your descendants’ and …

microBEnet Microbiology blog of the day: Daniel Wilson’s Blog

Going through the list of Microbiology Blogs we have curated at microBEnet and going to try to feature one of them every day or so.  And just going to do this in semi-alphabetic order. Today’s blog:  Daniel Wilson’s Blog Author:  Daniel Wilson Tagline/Summary:  I am an evolutionary biologist and researcher in genetics. I work at the University …

Microbiology blog of the day: BacPathGenomics

Going through the list of Microbiology Blogs we have curated at microBEnet and going to try to feature one of them every day or so.  And just going to do this in semi-alphabetic order. Today’s blog: BacPathGenomics Author: Kat Holt Tagline/Summary: Genomics and evolution of bacterial pathogens Recent Posts: Metagenomics analysis special issue in Briefings in Bioinformatics Phage annotation …

Postdoctoral fellowships in fungal taxonomy and genomics; one focused on fungi from dust #microBEnet

POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWSHIPS IN FUNGAL TAXONOMY AND GENOMICS. Keith Seifert is looking for two post-docs, one interested in the identification of microfungi, and the other interested in participating in a genome project, for two-year positions in Ottawa, Canada. The first position is funded by the A.P. Sloan Foundation. A large and diverse collection of 6000-7000 strains isolated by …

Genomic standards for microbial ecology studies (including built environment)

There is a new #openaccess article in ISME of great importance to those studying the microbiology of the built environment: The ISME Journal – The genomic standards consortium: bringing standards to life for microbial ecology.  This article focuses mostly on those characterizing “marker genes” (i.e., genes of value in phylogenetic characterization of taxa) in some way. …