Latest News

Clues beginning to emerge on asymtomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection
Back in November of 2020, during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, I was teaching an in-person microbiology laboratory. One of my students had just been home to see his parents, and they all c…
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Could there maybe be better uses of genetics and probiotics?
Professor Meng Dong and his laboratory have created a probiotic that can metabolize alcohol quickly and maybe prevent some of the adverse effects of alcohol consumption. The scientists cloned a highl…
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ChatGPT is not the end of essays in education
The takeover of AI is upon us! AI can now take all our jobs, is the click-bait premise you hear from the news. While I cannot predict the future, I am dubious that AI will play such a dubious role in…
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Fighting infections with infections
Multi-drug-resistant bacterial infections are becoming more of an issue, with 1.2 million people dying of previously treatable bacterial infections. Scientists are frantically searching for new metho…
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A tale of two colleges
COVID-19 at the University of Wisconsin this fall has been pretty much a non-issue. While we are wearing masks, full in-person teaching is happening on campus. Bars, restaurants, and all other busine…
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News

The very real danger of alfatoxins


  Food products, especially harvested grains, need to be stored carefully. Proper management means storing them in conditions that are cool and dry. If conditions become too hot or moist, it promotes the growth of molds, and many of them can produce mycotoxins. These harmful compounds can lead to death at high concentrations, but even at low levels have serious health effects such as cancer, liver problems, and immunosuppression. Jae-Hyuk Yu, a professor in the Bacteriology Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has some helpful information about mycotoxins that you should know.