We often hear about bacteria, but what exactly are they? A bacterium is a living organism that consists of a single cell (unicellular). It has ...

An analysis of the bones and teeth of ancient mammoths (Mammuthus) has identified some of the microorganisms that lived in the animals’ mouths and bodies more than one million years ago. The study, ...

Bacteria are constantly moving with the help of motility organs called flagella or pili to colonize new niches. Also, bacteria can exchange information, like "speaking to each other," and thus acquire ...

PHILADELPHIA — Deep in the mangrove swamps of the Caribbean lives a giant bacterium with a surprise trick for organizing its DNA. Thiovulum imperiosus wraps its genetic material in membranous fingers, ...

In 1952, Alfred Hershey of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and his lab technician, Martha Chase, wanted to confirm that DNA was the carrier of genetic information. They tagged the protein coating of ...

Scientists from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have developed a method to isolate genes from amounts of microbial DNA so tiny that it would take 20,000 samples to weigh as much as a ...

Researchers have analyzed ancient DNA from Borrelia recurrentis, a type of bacteria that causes relapsing fever, pinpointing when it evolved to spread through lice rather than ticks, and how it gained ...

Colibactin is a powerful toxin produced by Escherichia coli and other bacteria living in the human gut. This highly unstable bacterial product causes mutations in DNA that have been linked to ...

An entirely new approach to inhibiting DNA-cleaving enzymes works through the aggregation of an otherwise non-toxic molecule. This discovery may lead to a much-needed method for curbing Streptococcus ...