University of Florida assistant professor Michelle Danyluk was honored Wednesday evening with the Larry Beauchat Young Researcher Award from the International Association for Food Protection.

The award recognizes a member of the group who has shown outstanding ability and professional promise in the field of food microbiology and food safety.

Danyluk has developed a nationally noted food microbiology and safety program in citrus and other commodities, such as almonds and tropical juices. Her multistate “farm to fork” activities include leafy green food safety initiatives and the National Tree Crop Food Safety Research Symposia.

Since joining UF/IFAS in 2007, Danyluk has attracted more than $1 million for her research and extension programs and nearly $4 million to UF research overall.

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Researchers from Italy and the United States who worked with mouse and human cancer cells in laboratories said their work might help in developing a new drug in a class of cancer treatments called immunotherapies or therapeutic vaccines, which harness the body’s immune system to fight disease.

“We did experiments first in mice and then in cancer cells and immune cells from human patients, and found that the salmonella was doing exactly the same job,” Maria Rescigno of European Institute of Oncology in Milan, who worked on the study, said in a telephone interview. “Now we are ready to go into (testing on) humans, but we are waiting for authorization.”

The scientists said they thought the salmonella bacteria, which they used in a safe form that did not cause illness itself, helped to flag up cancer cells to the body’s immune system, which was then able to find and kill them.

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AgraQuest, Inc.’s Dr. Magalie Guilhabert-Goya, Group Leader for Microbiology, today presented “QST 713: A Microbe with Two Tales” at the 60th annual meeting of the Society for Industry Microbiology in San Francisco. Dr. Guilhabert-Goya focused her presentation on the strengths of the patented active ingredient Bacillus subtilis strain QST 713 contained in AgraQuest’s SERENADE® family of biofungicides.

These strengths, including activation of plants’ natural defenses, growth promotion and resistance to abiotic stress, make AgraQuest’s proprietary Bacillus subtilis strain QST 713 a valuable tool for both foliar and soil disease control in production agriculture. Field studies in potatoes, tomatoes and cucurbits demonstrate average yield increases of 12 to 15% when treated with SERENADE SOIL™ fungicide.

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The results of the international, regional and local Hygiene Home Truths Study 2010, were revealed today during the fifth annual Hygiene Council meeting held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The study, supported and organized by Dettol, showed that bathroom seals, the insides of fridges, general purpose kitchen towels and kettle handles are some of the most highly contaminated hygiene hotspots in homes worldwide and especially in Saudi Arabia – and are caused by ineffective cleaning.

According to the study, bathroom seals are the dirtiest site in homes worldwide, with over two thirds (70%) failing bacterial tests, and over half (56%) failing mould tests, despite more than a third (37%) appearing clean. This is a concern, as evidence from existing studies shows a relationship between the presence of household mould or damp and an increase in the incidence of health problems such as fungal infections, respiratory illness, asthma and allergies.[i], [ii], [iii], [iv]

The inside of fridges came a close second to bathroom seals in the contaminated hygiene hotspots stakes, with nearly half (46%) of households worldwide failing bacterial contamination tests and more than two fifths (44%) of households showing mould build up. Fridge temperatures were found to be unsatisfactory in many instances, allowing bacteria to grow to high numbers. Fridges were also found to be one of the least regularly items in the home, especially in terms of using disinfectant products such as Dettol.

In Saudi Arabian homes, the dirtiest items were bathroom seals and fridge interiors with nine out of ten (90%) of both areas found to be unsatisfactory or heavily contaminated – well above the global average. This finding was particularly surprising given the fact that the same number of people – nine out of ten householders (90%) – said that they cleaned their fridge at least once a week, with eight out of ten (80%) claiming to clean their bath or shower daily.

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Mobile phones can harbour 18 times more living bacteria than a flush handle on a men’s toilet, according to research for consumer group Which?

A hygiene expert who swabbed and analysed 30 handsets for the study found seven had warning or high levels of environmental bacteria.

One harboured levels of bacteria, including faecal coliforms, high enough to give its user a serious stomach upset.

Which? said the findings suggest millions of UK mobiles would exceed the recommended acceptable levels of bacteria.

While not immediately harmful, elevated levels indicate poor hygiene and can act as a breeding ground for more serious bacteria.

Bob Hancock, director of the UBC Centre for Microbial Diseases and Immunity Research, says swimming carries lesser risks compared to other summer hazards, like improperly grilling a burger. However, he cautioned that although the danger of infections isn’t that high, it always pays to be careful.

For example, Hancock said that swimming with too many people in the shallow waters of a beach boosts the chance of getting ill from E. coli. These bacteria are found in the digestive tracts of warm-blooded animals.

The UBC professor also said disease-causing bacteria like Shigella and Salmonella are likewise found near beaches. These come from the feces of animals and can cause stomach problems in humans.

People who want to cool off by dipping into small ponds of inland fresh water or rivers should be aware of two types of microscopic parasites: Giardia and Cryptosporidium.

Hancock explained that these come from either dead animals or fecal matter. Giardia and Cryptosporidium are known to cause gastrointestinal disorders. He added that these parasites are not common in big bodies of water like lakes.

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Two tips for preventing Johne’s disease on dairy farms: Use stainless steel water troughs and add chlorine to the water. That’s according to Kim Cook, an Agricultural Research Service (ARS) microbiologist at the agency’s Animal Waste Management Research Unit in Bowling Green, Ky. Cook did the research with Carl Bolster, a hydrologist at Bowling Green, and other colleagues.

Stainless steel troughs are expensive, but not as expensive as Johne’s disease. Caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium paratuberculosis, this disease can cause losses of as much as $200,000 per year in a herd of 1,000 dairy cows. The losses are mostly from a drop in milk production and the need to cull infected animals. A continued increase in the number of cases of Johne’s disease among dairy cattle suggests that there may be unknown sources of contamination on farms.
Cook thought that water troughs would provide a perfect home for bacteria, so she counted the Mycobacteria in the slimy layers in water on the sides of the most commonly used troughs: concrete, plastic, stainless steel, and galvanized steel. She wanted to see if there were differences in the ability of the bacteria to adhere to and survive on the surfaces of the different materials.

Cook found high concentrations of the bacteria on all troughs within three days of inoculating the water with the bacteria, and they survived for more than 149 days. But the bacterial survival rate was lowest on the stainless steel.

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National and global conferences on health, new age, new thought, green, meditation, and spiritual themes should be aware that when they run familiar and relaxing drumming circles at various convention hotels, the hides of the drums might contain animal hides that could conceivably spread anthrax microbes.

Does your drum contain anthrax? The anthrax spore form lives for years in the soil. When the spores surface, they revert to the vegetative form to cause further disease when eaten by animals.

Carcasses of animal dying with anthrax should not be opened as the vegetative form turns to spores when exposed to air.

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Researchers have published an analysis of 178 genomes from microbes that live in or on the human body. The accomplishment sets the stage to better understand how these diverse organisms affect human health and disease.

The Human Microbiome Project (HMP) was launched to catalog and explore the diverse microbial species—or microbiome—that inhabit the human body. The microorganisms living in and on the human body outnumber the body’s cells by 10 to 1. Some of these bacteria, fungi and viruses cause illnesses, but many are necessary for good health. Currently, researchers can grow only some in the laboratory. But using new genomic techniques, scientists can identify minute amounts of microbial DNA and compare sequences in databases.

Part of the first phase includes sequencing hundreds of microbial reference genomes. The effort is funded through the NIH Common Fund and involves several NIH components. Sequencing work for the project is done by HMP-funded large-scale sequencing centers around the country. Samples for the first phase are being collected from 5 body areas: the digestive tract, mouth, skin, nose and vagina.

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A research team led by scientists at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) at Virginia Tech has discovered a fundamental entry mechanism that allows dangerous fungal microbes to infect plants and cause disease. The discovery paves the way for the development of new intervention strategies to protect plant, and even some animal cells, from deadly fungal infections. The findings are published in the July 23 edition of the journal Cell.

The researchers have revealed how special disease-related proteins, known as effectors, blaze a trail into cells. Fungi and fungal-like microbes known as oomycetes produce effector molecules that penetrate cells and switch off the host’s defense system. Once the host’s immune system has been disabled, the fungus or oomycete swiftly follows up, breaking and entering the cell and unleashing disease.

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