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Tag: "hitchhike" at biology news

A virus-like hitchhiker may trigger bacterial meningitis

Reporting in the June 20 issue of The Journal of Experimental Medicine, a group of scientists in Paris, France led by Colin Tinsley may have discovered how a normally harmless bacterium can sometimes trigger outbreaks of life-threatening meningitis. . The human body harbors many harmless bacterial residents, known as commensals. One such bacterium, called Neisseria meningitidis, makes its home in...

Microbes hitchhike across Atlantic on desert dust

Bacteria and fungi, some with the potential to cause disease in plants or animals, may be finding their way from Africa to the Americas by hitchhiking on microscopic dust particles kicked up by storms in the Sahara, according to research presented today at the 106th General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology in Orlando, Florida. . "This study presents evidence of early summer survi...

Viral hitchhiker inhibits Wolbachia bacteria's ability to proliferate

Scientists studying the widespread symbiotic bacteria Wolbachia have long been interested in its ability to proliferate. One way it does this is by hijacking sperm of its insect hosts and genetically tricking them to bear more infected females, the only sex that transmits the bacteria. Now, a new study from the MBL (Marine Biological Laboratory), published in the May 18 issue of PLoS Pathogens,...