Michaelangelica Posted January 1, 2010 Author Report Share Posted January 1, 2010 The secret life of bacteria - small, smart and thoughtful! We can't survive without them -- and we've long underestimated their prowess. Controversially, bacteria could even have cognitive talents that rival our own. Predatory behaviour, cooperation, memory -- Jules Verne eat your heart out -- Natasha Mitchell takes you on a strange adventure into the secret world of microbial mentality. On this day tradition allotsTo taking stock of our livesMy greetings to all of you, Yeasts,Bacteria, VirusesAerobics and Anaerobics:A very happy New YearTo all for whom my ectodermIs as Middle Earth to me For creatures your size I offerA free choice of habitatSo settle yourselves in the zoneThat suits you best, in the poolsOf my pores or the tropicalForests of arm-pit and crotch,In the deserts of my forearms,Or the cool woods of my scalp.Build colonies: I will supplyAdequate warmth and moisture,The sebum and lipids you need,On condition you neverDo me annoy with your presence,But behave as good guests shouldNot rioting into acne, athlete's foot or a boil. A New Year Greeting - WH Auden May 1969 Natasha Mitchell: An unsettling revelation; you're not quite who you think you are. Hello, Natasha Mitchell with you on Radio National with All in the Mind. It turns out you are possibly only 1% human and 99% microbial if you were to do a cell count. So inspired by the likes of literary adventurer Jules Verne today on the show an excursion into the bewildering world of bacteria. . . .James Shapiro: Everywhere, they are in the air, in the water, they are in the soil, they are in the inside of rocks, in glaciers, bacteria are all around us. Most of the living material on planet Earth is microbial and they are carrying out so many of the important chemical processes, they are maintaining the mixture of gases in the atmosphere, they are cycling the carbon and nitrogen and sulphur wastes that are produced -- they are doing all kinds of really important jobs. They can do very well without us but we can't exist without them.The microbe serenade.A lovelorn microbe met by chanceAt a swagger bacteroidal danceA proud bacillian belle, and sheWas first of the animaculaeOf organism saccharineShe was the protoplasmic queen.The microscopical pride and petOf the biological smartest set,And so this infinitesimal swainEvolved a pleading low refrain: 'Oh lovely metamorphic germ,What futile scientific termCan well describe your many charms?Come to these embryonic armsThen hie away to my cellular home,And be my little diatom!' His epithelium burned with loveHe swore by molecules aboveShe'd be his own gregarious mate,Or else he would disintegrate.This amorous mite of a parasitePursued the germ both day and night,And 'neath her window often playedThis Darwin-Huxley serenadeHe'd warble to her every dayThis rhizopodical roundelay: 'Oh most primordial of sporeI never met your like beforeAnd though a microbe has no heart,From you, sweet germ, I'll never part.We'll sit beneath some fungus growthTill dissolution claims us both!' George Ade 1906. All In The Mind - 7 November 2008 - The secret life of bacteria - small, smart and thoughtful! [Highlight from the archive] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erich Posted January 14, 2010 Report Share Posted January 14, 2010 Hi Wee-Beasters, I wonder if the nitrogen isotope measurements used in this study could be applied to determine the effects seen on the nitrogen cycle with biochar amendment ?; Erich Keeping tabs on nitrogen The presence of nitrogen is essential for land to act as a carbon sink. But the element can be lost from soil by leaching and by the actions of denitrifying bacteria. To date it's been unclear how much of a role these bacteria play. Now researchers from the University of California Davis, US, have found that soil denitrification is responsible for around one-third of the nitrogen lost from unmanaged land. Keeping tabs on nitrogen - environmentalresearchweb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Essay Posted January 17, 2010 Report Share Posted January 17, 2010 It's a busy month (and I didn't take microbiology in college), so I can't write much, but.... Sometimes the farmer will add ammonia to his fields as a fertilizer; and...Nitrous Oxide -- N2O, the bad GHG -- is evolved when ammonium is oxidized to nitrite. Nitrification, turning (oxidizing) mineral fertilizers or ammonia into the nitrates that plants use, is a complex process.There are lots of different nitrifying/denitrifying microbes that contribute to the equilibria between the reduced ammonium or nitrous oxide and the (respectively) more oxidized nitric oxide, nitrite, and finally nitrate.=== ...evidence indicates [Lehmann, et al., 2009]....Biochar enhances the diversity of the nitrifier and denitrifier microbes within the soil profile. A diversity in oxygen-rich & oxygen-poor niches (within an overall aerobic soil) allows the full range of the nitrogen cycle's chemical equilibria to flourish.Biochar provides that diversity of environmental niches, where those microbes can manage the nitrogen cycle's equilibria, maximizing nitrogen's availability as a fertilizer. Biochar enhances nitrogen cycling when it adsorbs chemical inhibitors of important enzymes in the nitrogen cycle.Biochar enhances the retention of "by-product" metabolites from denitrifiers (mainly N2O), allowing nitrifiers to produce more nitrates (or for the reduction to the non-GHG, N2).=== It's fairly rare to find any bad Effects of Biochar. ~ :hihi: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michaelangelica Posted February 19, 2010 Author Report Share Posted February 19, 2010 New Edge Microbials New Edge Microbials (NEM) supplies beneficial live microbial cultures to the agriculture industry in Australia. NEM specialises in the marketing of Rhizobium Legume Inoculants and VA Mycorrhiza into broad-acre farming systems. Depending on the application and formulation restrictions of the active ingredient, NEM can supply live microbial cultures as liquids, dry powders, and in vacuum sealed vials.New Edge Microbials Albury Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erich Posted April 1, 2010 Report Share Posted April 1, 2010 NOT so Wee-Beasties Monster Isopods Yard-Long Undersea Bug Terrorizes Robo-Sub, Internet | Popular Science How different Farming would be if they were this size in the soil, maybe they would farm us as a sort of cover crop? Great Video Erich Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erich Posted May 20, 2010 Report Share Posted May 20, 2010 A Survey of most all the Micro-Wee-Beasties in TP A Molecular Survey of the Diversity of Microbial Communitiesin Different Amazonian Agricultural Model SystemsAcácio A. Navarrete †, Fabiana S. Cannavan †, Rodrigo G. Taketani and Siu M. Tsai * http://www.mdpi.com/1424-2818/2/5/787/pdf Biochar; Impact on Soil Microbial EcologyTeesside University http://www.geos.ed.ac.uk/sccs/biochar/rothamsted2010/UKBRC2010_Maruthi.pdf where did they get, 0r why did they test 50% W / W ? That's more char than I've ever head of. ( Except for Dr. Ng in Malaysia growing rice in 100% char.)Soil is about 90 Lbs / cubic foot, Char 15 lbs / cubic foot, that is alot-O-Char! Erich Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maikeru Posted May 21, 2010 Report Share Posted May 21, 2010 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
erich Posted May 22, 2010 Report Share Posted May 22, 2010 Study of the stability of biochar in organic matter-rich soils and its influence on the dynamics of native organic matterBiochar - saman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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