Motivating college students toward COVID vaccinations must include campus peer influencers listening and giving accurate, memorable, and clear information. Swag wouldn’t hurt either. “Vaccines will soon be available for all Maryland adults – when will you get yours? a) I’ve already gotten it b) ASAP c) Eventually d) When they make me e) I won’t My sample size was small ~ 40 students in my General Microbiology class. We’re over halfway through the semester and they are used to my passion for microbiology and concern for their success as well. The poll was anonymous, one of the ways I like to start class to build community and check in with students during these crazy virtual times. I was shocked. A quarter of the students were in the last 2 categories – “When they make me” or “I won’t”! WHAT? These students have had their fun, activity-packed college career upended by a pandemic! Online classes rip away existing structure, can be isolating, and requires much more preparation and time on the instructor and students. Students with mental health crises are skyrocketing. Grandparents and parents are dying of COVID. They are struggling. We as faculty are struggling. Yes, half of the students
PATHOGENESIS 2.0 and the “Sex”spansion
It’s back and sexier than ever! My family’s favorite deck building game – Pathogenesis – expands to include an “adult” version as it launches a 2nd printing on Kickstarter February 12, 2019. No longer is your custom-created microbial army limited to attacking skin, gastrointestinal (GI), or respiratory (lung) systems. Instead, Pathogenesis gets sexy with specialized sexually transmitted disease (STD) microbes attacking the Genitourinary tract (GU). In turn, the human body comes to version 2.0 with a strengthened immune system that makes it harder than ever to beat. Which tract will you colonize? Will you succeed in penetrating the body’s barriers and dismantle the active immune system? Play and see. What is Pathogenesis? Pathogenesis is a deck-building game where you are tasked with creating a pathogen to *cue scary music * attack and destroy an organ system of the human body. In Pathogenesis everyone starts with the same number of starter cards (a mix of DNA cards and microbes). Each turn you can select a new trait (that enters your draw pile for future turns), add traits from your current hand to your pathogen pile, attack, and redraw. As you successfully attack the human body, you gain DNA points that can
Time is Running Out for “Culture as Medium”
If you are in the Baltimore area between now and May 20th and haven’t experienced an aspect of the science-art exhibit – Culture as Medium – time is running out! Culture as Medium, celebrates Baltimore as a growing and thriving biotechnology and artistic hot spot, while encompassing the complexity and diversity of the city. The exhibit explores the intersection of art and science through exhibiting art by internationally recognized scientists and artists, as well as several performance art/science opportunities. Culture as Medium is an “evolving” exhibit inviting visitors to explore and merge the boundaries of art and science, the visible and invisible portions of our world. Opening at the Motor House Curated by Margaret MacDonald of the Maryland Institute of Art (MICA), Culture as Medium, spans different areas of the city. The first installation of the exhibit opened at the Motor House in the Station North Arts and Entertainment District on April 1st. Dr. François Joseph Lapointe from the University of Montreal conducted a performance “microbiome selfie” collecting microbiome samples from his tongue every 10 minutes after eating kimchi for an hour. Kimchi was chosen for his food microbiome selfie to honor the Koren population in the surrounding area. Visitors
Book Review: The Invisible War
The graphic novel “The Invisible War: A Tale on Two Scales” tells stories of the macroscopic (nurses) and microscopic (bacteriophage) heroes fighting dysentery at the Western Front of World War I. Interweaving Views of Tales, Scales, and Heroes “The Invisible War: A Tale of Two Scales” works its magic, interweaving the stories of two rarely discussed topics – dysentery and bacteriophage – and two rarely intertwined fields of study – science and history. The resulting story is a rich tapestry full of action and information at both the macroscopic and microscopic levels. “The Invisible War” tells about Annie, a nurse at a field hospital at the Western Front of World War I. In her nursing experience, Annie has learned the symptoms and consequences of dysentery, at a time when the cause wasn’t well understood and no reliable cure was known.
Bacterial Farts – Whoopie!
Of all the bacterial communities in and on humans, we know the most about the digestive system bacteria. These microbes are extremely important for proper digestion of plant fibers, synthesizing vitamins, short-chain fatty acids, protecting our gut lining, breaking down medicines, and many other properties we are still learning about. One of my favorite science podcasts, Brains’s On!, does a fun job talking about our gut bacterial friends from a different perspective – farts! Depending on your microbial community and what you feed it, sometimes as your microbes are doing their work breaking down the foods we eat they give off gaseous compounds.