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Full-Text Articles in Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Structural Biology

Phenotypic Switching Of Bacterial Cells In Extreme Environments, Sudip Nepal Jul 2020

Phenotypic Switching Of Bacterial Cells In Extreme Environments, Sudip Nepal

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A large number of terrestrial microbial lives thrive in extremes of environmental conditions, including extremes of pressure, temperature, salinity, pH, and a combination of them. For example, all the marine biomass thrive at high hydrostatic pressure depending on depth. The temperature in the ocean can be very high near the hydrothermal vents and salinity and pH depends on the composition of salt in the surrounding areas. On the surface, hot springs, lakes and geysers provide high temperature conditions, while many places are permafrost regions with subzero temperatures. There is an emerging body of work on the viability, genomics, and metagenomics …


Microbiomes Of Caribbean Octocorals Vary Over Time But Are Resistant To Environmental Change, Mark Mccauley, Colin R. Jackson, Tamar Goulet Jun 2020

Microbiomes Of Caribbean Octocorals Vary Over Time But Are Resistant To Environmental Change, Mark Mccauley, Colin R. Jackson, Tamar Goulet

Faculty and Student Publications

The bacterial microbiome is an essential component of many corals, although knowledge of the microbiomes in scleractinian corals far exceeds that for octocorals. This study characterized the bacterial communities present in shallow water Caribbean gorgonian octocorals over time and space, in addition to determining the bacterial assemblages in gorgonians exposed to environmental perturbations. We found that seven shallow water Caribbean gorgonian species maintained distinct microbiomes and predominantly harbored two bacterial genera, Mycoplasma and Endozoicomonas. Representatives of these taxa accounted for over 70% of the sequences recovered, made up the three most common operational taxonomic units (OTUs), and were present in …


Hexadecane Petroleum, And Biofuel Utilization In Marine Bacteria Isolated From Ballast Tanks, Alex Yashchenko May 2020

Hexadecane Petroleum, And Biofuel Utilization In Marine Bacteria Isolated From Ballast Tanks, Alex Yashchenko

Graduate Theses

This study characterized the growth of bacteria isolated from ballast tank fluids in hexadecane, petroleum, plant, and algae-derived fuels. The study was performed to explore the capacity of ballast tank isolates to survive and grow within fuels that may be stored within ballast tanks. Results of the hexadecane analysis indicated that most isolates had higher viable cell counts in media supplemented with hexadecane. Members of Alteromonas, Pseudoalteromonas, and a single Brevundimonas species had viable cell counts that were one or several orders ofmagnitude greater than that of controls. Results offuel analysis indicated higher viable cell counts in pure JP-5 and …


Triggers Of Inflammatory Heart Disease, Ninaad Lasrado, Bharathi Yalaka, Jay Reddy Jan 2020

Triggers Of Inflammatory Heart Disease, Ninaad Lasrado, Bharathi Yalaka, Jay Reddy

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Faculty Publications

Inflammatory heart disease (IHD) is a group of diseases that includes pericarditis, myocarditis, and endocarditis. Although males appear to be more commonly affected than females, IHD can be seen in any age group. While the disease can be self-limiting leading to full recovery, affected individuals can develop chronic disease, suggesting that identification of primary triggers is critical for successful therapies. Adding to this complexity, however, is the fact that IHD can be triggered by a variety of infectious and non-infectious causes that can also occur as secondary events to primary insults. In this review, we discuss the immunological insights into …


Metabolic Feedback Inhibition Influences Metabolite Secretion By The Human Gut Symbiont Bacteroides Thetaiotaomicron, Jennie L. Catlett, Jonathan Catazaro, Mikaela Cashman, Sean Carr, Robert Powers, Myra B. Cohen, Nicole R. Buan Jan 2020

Metabolic Feedback Inhibition Influences Metabolite Secretion By The Human Gut Symbiont Bacteroides Thetaiotaomicron, Jennie L. Catlett, Jonathan Catazaro, Mikaela Cashman, Sean Carr, Robert Powers, Myra B. Cohen, Nicole R. Buan

Department of Biochemistry: Faculty Publications

Microbial metabolism and trophic interactions between microbes give rise to complex multispecies communities in microbe-host systems. Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron (B. theta) is a human gut symbiont thought to play an important role in maintaining host health. Untargeted nuclear magnetic resonance metabolomics revealed B. theta secretes specific organic acids and amino acids in defined minimal medium. Physiological concentrations of acetate and formate found in the human intestinal tract were shown to cause dose-dependent changes in secretion of metabolites known to play roles in host nutrition and pathogenesis. While secretion fluxes varied, biomass yield was unchanged, suggesting feedback inhibition does not affect metabolic …


Determining The Age Of Spoiled Milk From Dried Films Using Attenuated Reflection Fourier Transform Infrared (Atr Ft-Ir) Spectroscopy, Zack Richardson, David Perezguaita, Kamila Kochan, Bayden Wood Jan 2020

Determining The Age Of Spoiled Milk From Dried Films Using Attenuated Reflection Fourier Transform Infrared (Atr Ft-Ir) Spectroscopy, Zack Richardson, David Perezguaita, Kamila Kochan, Bayden Wood

Articles

Milk spoilage is an inevitable occurrence, which generates waste and can result in food poisoning. When milk spoils, the off-flavor and curdling are due to excessive proliferation of various bacteria which causes pH changes. Time, temperature, environment,and previous handling practice all affects the spoilage rate. There is a need for a fast reliable and accurate method that can identify in situearly spoilage of milk. Here we show the ability of attenuated total reflectionFourier transformed infrared spectroscopy(ATR FT-IR) in conjunction with multivariate data analysis to predict the age of milk. We found that dried films vastly increased the absorbance of important …


An Evaluation Of Co-Culture Parameters Effecting Antibiotic Production In Soil Microbes, Rebecca Lindow Jan 2020

An Evaluation Of Co-Culture Parameters Effecting Antibiotic Production In Soil Microbes, Rebecca Lindow

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The rise of infections caused by antibiotic resistant bacteria, compounded by a reduction in antibiotic discovery and development, jeopardizes human health. Historically, antibiotics derive from secondary metabolites produced by soil microbes in pure culture, but recent genetic evidence suggests that microbes can produce more secondary metabolites than are currently observed. The modified crowded plate technique directly identifies antibiotic-producing soil microbes that were co-plated with a target pathogen. Here, this technique was refined by testing the effect of a D-alanine auxotrophic target pathogen rather than a prototrophic pathogen as well as investigating conditions most conducive to antibiotic production. Antibiotic producing conditions …