“I know of no time which is lost more thoroughly than that devoted to arguing on matters of fact with a disputant who has no facts but only very strong convictions” (Simon, 1996). The comment aptly summarizes a common experience (including my own) in dealing with technophobes. In one sense, the genetic manipulation (GM) debate can only be conducted on a level in which the participants are prepa...

We report here the complete annotated genome sequence of a clinical serovar 8 isolate Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae MIDG2331. Unlike the serovar 8 reference strain 405, MIDG2331 is amenable to genetic manipulation via natural transformation as well as conjugation, making it ideal for studies of gene function.

Development of multicellular organisms is temporally and spatially complex. The Cre/loxP and Flp/FRT systems for genetic manipulation in mammals now enable researchers to explicitly examine in vivo the temporal and spatial role of cells and genes during development via cell lineage and ablation studies and conditional gene inactivation and activation. Recently we have used these methods to gene...

Vomocytosis, or nonlytic extrusion, is a poorly understood process through which macrophages release live pathogens that they have failed to kill back into the extracellular environment. Vomocytosis is conserved across vertebrates and occurs with a diverse range of pathogens, but to date, the host signaling events that underpin expulsion remain entirely unknown. We use a targeted inhibitor scre...

Staphylococcus epidermidis 1457 is a frequently utilized strain that is amenable to genetic manipulation and has been widely used for biofilm-related research. We report here the whole-genome sequence of this strain, which encodes 2,277 protein-coding genes and 81 RNAs within its 2.4-Mb genome and plasmid.

A genetic algorithm is simulated using human beings as "chromosomes" in a preliminary study intended to quantify and interpret the effect of intelligent information exchange on genetic algorithm performance. Two factors are varied: the amount of information supplied to the cohort and the type of data manipulation allowed during the exchange. A human simulated genetic algorithm is run for each c...

The genus Rickettsia includes the causative agents of some of the most historically significant and severe bacterial diseases of humans. These include Rickettsia prowazekii, the agent responsible for epidemic typhus, and R. rickettsii, the agent of Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Additional species, including R. typhi, responsible for murine or endemic typhus, and others, responsible for a variet...

Flavobacterium columnare, an important pathogen of freshwater fish, can infect wild, farmed and ornamental fish species worldwide and cause heavy mortality and economic loss. However, reports about protective antigens and virulence factors of F. columnare are rare. Although chondroitin AC lyase has been reported as a probable virulence factor for its degradation of chondroitin sulphates, it has...

Over the past two decades, the ability to transfer genes into hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) has provided new insights into the behavior of individual stem cells and offered a novel approach for the treatment of various inherited or acquired disorders. At present, gene transfer into HSCs has been achieved mainly using modified retroviruses. While retrovirus-based vectors could efficiently tran...