The “Good” guys: the human-superorganism

Image Credit: Jon Berkeley / SPL @TheEconomist

“When one tugs at a single thing in nature, one finds it attached to the rest of the world.” – John Muir

Post Highlights:

We have over 10 times more microbial cells (estimated 100 trillion) than human cells in our bodies

Microorganisms make up about 1 to 3 percent of the body’s mass (in a 200-pound adult, that’s two to six pounds of bacteria) and are…

Contagious or Not: A dissection of infectious disease

Originally posted on Bridging Biotech:

I love Austin, TX, it’s an amazing place to call home.  Unfortunately, this past month it seems like microbes apparently share the same sentiment.  A new form of “keeping Austin weird”? — micro-organismic diversity. Infections seem to be running rampant, and practically everyone I know has been infected with some variation of virus, bacterium, or wandering…