Need some good microbiology kids books? Take a look at the Reading Round-Up!
Reading Round-Up: Microbiology Books for Kids!
The Great Yogurt Experiment: Part II – Mesophilic (room temperature) Heirloom yogurt
Tasting the bacterial diversity and seeing pH difference using yogurt fermentation for microbiology teaching. I love the idea that invisible microbes can change their habitat so much we macro-organisms will pay attention and even help them! After all, people have maintained yogurt cultures for generations. Take for example the Heirloom yogurts from Culture for Health that I have been playing with and am considering sending to my General Microbiology class this semester. One overarching theme in my microbiology class is always that microbial diversity provides multiple solutions to the same “problem”. Diversity Matters! In this case – different combinations of bacteria can take the same milk, break-up the milk sugars, and poop out lactic acid. The lactic acid lowers the pH of the yogurt, which protects yogurt from pathogenic bacteria (molds can still grow though given enough time). Lactic acid gives the tart, sour taste to yogurt. To teach my General Microbiology students that microbes – just by growing – can dramatically change their habitat. This semester students will culture their own yogurt to see and taste the difference! The problem is most store-bought yogurts grow best at 113 °F (45 °C). That’s pretty warm. That was tricky during my
Book Review: Dirt is Good
Dirt is Good: The Advantages of Germs for Your Child’s Developing Immune System answers parent’s questions about the microbiome and their kid’s health. Parents, hold on to your diaper bags, Dirt is Good: The Advantages of Germs for Your Child’s Developing Immune System seeks to answer microbiome-related parenting questions. Science writer Sandra Blakeslee teams up with microbiome scientists, Rob Knight, PhD and Jack Gilbert, PhD, to eloquently capture the answers to the hundreds of questions Rob and Jack have been asked by concerned parents. After a general introduction about the human microbiome, Dirt is Good starts with the interaction of the microbiome and human immune system in pregnancy. Continuing on through birth, first foods (both liquid and solid), the book touches on a range of topics organized loosely into chapters including the environment, conditions, depression, vaccines, and tests. There’s an amazing diversity of chapter topics. What Dirt is Good does well Talks candidly, clearly, and quickly about the current understanding of the microbiome and children’s health. Dirt is Good is clear about not overselling the microbiome and current probiotics. Throughout the book are stories of how their experience as parents and microbiome researchers change their ideas of cleanliness and health. What is
Microbial “Trash” is Human Treasure
We humans have been treasuring and using microbial “trash” for tens of thousands of years. We eat and nurture microbes for their waste products – yes, you eat microbial poop. Metabolic by-products or “waste” would be more appropriate to say in a classroom/polite company, but really – it’s just “poop”. Yogurt, sauerkraut, buttermilk, kefir, bread, beer, wine, cheese, even chocolate, and coffee – are all tasty to us because microbes have eaten the sugars in milk or some plant part. With the exception of corn, whatever you eat goes into your mouth in one form and comes out the other end in a totally different form. Same with microbes. Bacterial Poop: Sugars to Lactic Acid Bacteria like Lactobacillus sp. eat lactose milk sugars and poop out lactic acid. That’s why unflavored, unsugared yogurt is tangy and slightly sour. Same thing with the buttermilk I’ve been culturing recently. YUMMY. Other Lactobacillus sp. eat plant fiber sugars and poop out lactic acid to make sauerkraut and kimchee. Check out a yogurt experiment my girls and I did a while ago. Yes, the girls roll their eyes when I say that they are eating microbial “trash”. Fungal Farts: Sugars to alcohol and carbon
Dear Beyoncé: May The Carter Twins Meet Helpful Microbial Life Partners
An open letter to Beyoncé wishing her and her family well as the twins meet their microbial partners for life. Dear Beyoncé, As you wait and prepare for the twins’ birth please don’t forget the invisible microbes that will protect, feed, and teach your babies for the rest of their lives. Yep, I’m talking about “germs” or more politically correctly – “microbes”. Babies are “microbe magnets”. Those first microbes that baby encounters become their microbes for life. They are stuck together – life partners in sickness and in health. What’s cool is that these microbes are security guards keeping away diseases, chefs chopping up food to feed baby, and soothing Jedi masters who teach baby’s immune system what to kill and what to ignore. In my grandmother’s day, people in developed countries died from communicable diseases – polio, mumps, measles, yellow fever. Diseases that are spread from person to person by sneezing, coughing, or spread by insects, like mosquitos. Today people die from non-communicable diseases – diabetes, allergies, asthma, autoimmune diseases, and more. Our diseases today aren’t due to specific microbial pathogens. Vaccines, handwashing, clean water, sewers, and antibiotics keep these easy-to-spread microbial diseases at low numbers. Instead, today’s diseases