When Bacteria and Biology Collide

[Diane]

I was roaming around blogs this morning and found Steve Silberman's (http://levity.com/digaland/), contributing editor at Wired magazine, and a list of interesting articles. Check out The Invisible Enemy (http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.02/enemy.html), the story of a superbug that has colonized the "evacuation chain" of wounded soldiers from Iraq to Germany to N. America. Canadians and Brits are not exempt.

Maybe the "winner" in any conflict is simply the side with the strongest immune system. One is reminded of the world-wide flu that caused WWI to falter and fade.

Maybe humans are pawns of microbes using us as vectors to make war and otherwise disturb nature so they can meet new members with whom they can cross-genome.

[Diane]

Meanwhile, here is another perspective from Harvard magazine, The Undiscovered Planet: Microbial science illuminates a world of astounding diversity. (http://www.harvardmagazine.com/2007/11/p-the-undiscovered-planet.html)

Thank you Deric Bowds (http://mindblog.dericbownds.net/), as always.