If you crack open a TV, your laptop or your phone, you’ll see that their parts look very similar: resistances, capacitors, transistors… You could take some of these parts, use them in another device, and they would work! Although it seems natural now, this standardisation was everything but spontaneous. It took (and still takes) a [...]
1. A farewell to antibiotic-resistant #bacteria! 🦠🚫 This new plastic film could keep these microbes off surfaces 👇 Most bacteria are harmless but there are a few species that can infect us and make us ill. These potentially dangerous microbes can become a real headache for professionals working in restaurants or hospitals, where an [...]
Last week the R4B team met in Brussels for the second Review Meeting. It has been 36 months of hard work, some obstacles, lots of results and great progress that we got to share with EC Officer Carmen de Vicente and the expert Michael Desvaux. After this very fruitful meeting we are ready to dive [...]
1. All for one and one for all! ⚔ Some #bacteria can resist #antibiotics by acting as if they were just one organism! 🦠 Antibiotic resistant bacteria are one of the major health threats of our times. Among the most dangerous ones, Pseudomonas aeruginosa stands out. These microbes are particularly dangerous for people enduring [...]
Climate change. Loss of biodiversity in both land and the oceans. Inequality and poverty. There are many global challenges that humankind must face in order to bring peace and welfare to everyone. With this in mind, the United Nations adopted in 2015 the Agenda for Sustainable Development, a global blueprint towards a better life for [...]
The climate crisis is a pressing and complex matter that requires varied, innovative solutions: manufacturers changing the way they produce consumer goods, regulations that foster those changes, and social movements that support the shifts, to mention a few. Today we want to talk about how synthetic biology is helping with it: transforming the raw CO2 [...]
1. Animals like birds use scents to exchange information 👃 These ‘smelly’ signals have an unexpected origin: #bacteria 🦠👇 Smell is one of the main senses for animals: it helps them in tasks such as detecting danger or locating food. Of course, birds aren’t an exception: they use odors to check out the hormonal [...]
1. Halloween is coming! 🎃 What about some spooky bacteria to celebrate it? 👻 These zombie #AwesomeMicrobes will fill your nightmares 🧟♂️ Here come the living dead! Well, don’t panic! Although they are known as ‘zombie’ bacteria, they have no interest in devouring your brain. These microbes are called this way because they can [...]
Spidersilk with unusual strength. Vanillin to make ice-creams taste delicious. Insulin that saves thousands of lives. All these interesting products can be produced in bacteria thanks to synthetic biology and they all have faced a crucial step in their development: what microorganism should be the chosen one? Currently, two main protagonists take over the stage: [...]
IGEM 2019 is around the corner! Our partner Auke van Heel tells us about this great synbio initiative in our latest #FutureOfSynbio video
