At Microbe 2017 in New Orleans, the TWiM team speaks with Arturo Casadevall about his thoughts on the pathogenic potential of a microbe, rigorous science, funding by lottery, and moonshot science.

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Michael Schmidt, Elio Schaechter and Michele Swanson.

Guest: Arturo Casadevall

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Links for this episode

• Pathogenic potential of a microbe (mSphere)

• Rigorous science (mBio)

• Funding by lottery (mBio)

• Moonshot science (mBio)

Send your microbiology questions and comments (email or recorded audio) to [email protected]

Step inside the creative process with Agar Art 2015 winners Maria Peñil Cobo, Mixed Media Artist, and Mehmet Berkmen, PhD, Staff Scientist at New England Biolabs. During their multi-year collaboration, Maria and Memo have created astonishing works of art using living microbes. Find out how they meld science and art with this behind-the-scenes how-to video guide. Inspired? Submit your own agar art to ASM’s Agar Art 2017 contest through April 27, 2017 - http://www.asm.org/index.php/public-outreach/agar-art

Prizes include up to $200 in Amazon gift cards and the chance for your art to be featured in the Agar Art Gallery at ASM Microbe 2017 (http://www.asm.org/index.php/asm-microbe-2017), June 1-5, 2017 in New Orleans, LA. Submissions must be high-resolution photos of an organism(s) growing on agar. Submitting artists must be ASM members ( http://asmscience.org/content/membership/all) or work with an official ASM Agar Art partner organization to create the submitted piece. Questions? Contact [email protected].

Veteran medical journalist Meredith Wadman discusses her book The Vaccine Race. It tells the timely, epic, and controversial story of the development of the first widely-used normal human cell line and, through it, important viral vaccines, including the vaccine for rubella (German measles). Far from being an instrument of history, vaccine development in the modern era is targeting new (and reemerging) infectious diseases, including Ebola, Zika, Influenza and Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV). Dr. April Killikelly, a scientist at NIH's Vaccine Research Center, discusses the latest tools and technologies used to design tomorrow’s vaccines.

What happens to us after we die?  A decomposing corpse becomes its own mini-ecosystem, hosting insects, scavengers and multitudes of microbes.  Microbes from the environment, the corpse, as well as the insects and scavengers are blended together and work to recycle tissues back to their constituents.  Dr. Jennifer DeBruyn discusses the fascinating process of human decomposition, and how scientists are using that information to inform forensic science, livestock mortality management and fossilization.   

Dr. Michael Diamond, 2016 Elizabeth O. King Lecturer, has worked for the past two decades investigating how viruses work, with a goal of defining basic principles of pathogenesis and host immune restriction.

His talk will focus on how his laboratory has studied three emerging mosquito-transmitted viruses (West Nile, Chikungunya, and Zika viruses) of global importance from a basic perspective, and how this information facilitates the development of diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines.

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Written and Produced by Erika Shugart, PhD

Narration by Chaseedaw Giles

Filmed and Edited by Sam Mandl and Chris Condayan

Production Supervisor Katherine Lontok, PhD

Additional Video Footage by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

Photography and Illustrations from http://iStockphoto.com http://wikimedia.org http://epa.gov http://cdc.org/phil

Royalty Free Music by "Fearless" by Reaktor Productions "Easy Does It" by Olive Musique "Green Fever" by Flash Fluharty "Where I am From" by Topher Mohr and Alex Elena "Back of the Room Hang" by Jingle Punks

Additional Photography

"Nitrogen Defeciency in Wheat" by CIMMT on Flickr Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

"Material Girl" Madonna Parody

Performed by Chaseedaw Giles

Music track courtesy of Karaoke Version and Tency Music http://www.karaoke-version.com http://www.tencymusic.com

Filmed live at ASM Biodefense 2016 with special guests: Rebekah Kading and Wyndham Lathem.

From the ASM Biodefense and Emerging Diseases Research meeting, Vincent Racaniello speaks with Rebekah and Wyndham about their work on Rift Valley Fever virus and other vector-borne pathogens, and the evolution and pathogenesis of Yersinia pestis, the agent of plague.

See the video version at microbeworld.org/mwv

Why are obesity, juvenile diabetes and asthma increasing? Is it something in the environment or in our modern lifestyle? Dr. Martin Blaser thinks that it may be due to changes in our microbiome – the ecosystem of tiny microscopic creatures that live in and on us. Learn about his hypothesis that some of the greatest medical advances in the 20th century – antibiotics, C-sections and antiseptics- may be having unintended consequences. Dr. Martin Blaser has studied the role of bacteria in human disease for over 30 years. He is the director of the Human Microbiome Program at NYU. He founded the Bellevue Literary Review and has been written about in newspapers including The New Yorker, Nature, Science, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. His more than 100 media appearances include The Today Show, The Daily Show, Fresh Air (NPR) GMA, the BBC, The O'Reilly Factor, and CNN. He lives in New York City.

Vincent take This Week in Microbiology to the University of California, San Diego campus and into the the laboratories of Kit and Joseph Pogliano, where he learns about their work on the bacterial cytoskeleton, sporulation, and the effects of antibiotics on bacterial cells.

Vincent, Elio, and Michele meet with Harry Mobley, Mary O’Riordan, and Vince Young at the University of Michigan, during the designation of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology as a Milestones in Microbiology site. They discuss how the laboratory has advanced the science and teaching of microbiology, and discuss faculty work on uropathogenic E. coli, induction of stress by bacterial infection, and the gut microbiome.