1,800 Species of Microbial Organisms in Texas Cities' Air

Originally posted by NumberCruncher

I remember reading an article about how the technology exists to produce Chemical / Bio Logical weapons that only effect the said targeted Human Race by specifying the DNA that different Human races have, for example a White person would have a particular DNA that is not shared with a Yellow person.

Originally posted by DYepes
Does anyone beleive that the bacteria humans are exposed to naturally possibly makes our immune system stronger?

www.apha.org...

- 20065 Potential Risks of Nanotechnology - Addresses the potential environmental and occupational health and safety risks of nanotechnology as well as the design and manipulation of atomic materials. Urges Congress and federal agencies to substantially increase funding for environmental and occupational health and safety surrounding nanotechnology. Urges manufacturers to voluntarily adopt safeguards. Urges federal agencies to develop regulations and standards if needed.

- LB-06-01 Prevention and Control of Multidrug-Resistant Organisms - Encourages and promotes rigorous infection prevention and control practices in health care settings. Stresses the need for health care quality and standards-setting organizations to create additional infection prevention and control standards, alerts and patient safety goals focused on multidrug-resistant organism prevention, identification and control.

"Before this study, no one had a sense of the diversity of the microbes in the air," says lead author Gary Andersen of Berkeley Lab's Earth Sciences Division.

The research, which will be published this week in the online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, serves two purposes. It paves the way for regional bacterial censuses that will help a Department of Homeland Security bioterrorism surveillance program differentiate between normal and suspicious fluctuations in airborne pathogens. It will also help scientists establish a baseline of airborne microbes, which they can use to track how climate change affects bacterial populations.

"We need to determine what's in the air, so we can determine how climate change affects microbial diversity," says Andersen. "We found that there are a lot of airborne bacteria, including pathogens, which we did not know are out there."

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The air you breathe is loaded with microbes

In the past, scientists relied on bacterial cultures to identify microbes in air samples. This approach, however, can't pick up organisms unable to survive in the culture, which can be up to 99 percent of the bacteria in a sample.

Instead, Andersen and his colleagues used a DNA micro-array to probe air samples for a gene involved in producing a protein, called 16S rRNA, that is found in all bacteria. Called the "PhyloChip," the quarter-size device [image] can detect up to 9,000 unique versions of this gene, each one belonging to a different type of bacteria.

A global census of airborne bacteria wouldalso allow scientists to better track the effects of climate change on microbial populations in the atmosphere. For example, scientists have recently linked wind-blown dust from Africa's Sahara desert that reaches North America to increases in asthma in the Caribbean.

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Wind-blown dust from the expanding Sahara Desert reaches far out into the Atlantic Ocean

The team also determined that location was not as strong a source of microbial variation as time and weather. Specifically, the time of the year during the 17-week testing period was the most significant source of variation, followed by atmospheric conditions. For example, warmer and dryer conditions led to increased amounts of spore-forming bacteria.

"This information may help explain temporal spikes, which is important in bioterror surveillance," adds Eoin Brodie, also with Berkeley Lab’s Earth Sciences Division. "A spike may not be due to a biological attack, but to normal weather fluctuations that draw bacteria up from their natural reservoir."

Bird deaths shut down downtown Austin

As many as 60 dead pigeons, sparrows and grackles were found overnight along Congress Avenue, a main route through downtown. No human injuries or illnesses were reported.

"We do not feel there is a threat to the public health," said Adolfo Valadez, the medical director for Austin and Travis County Health and Human Services.

He said preliminary air-quality tests showed no dangerous chemicals, though the dead birds would be sent for further testing to rule out viruses or poison.