How can you tell if harmful bacteria are in your food or water that might make you sick? What you eat or drink can be contaminated with bacteria, viruses, parasites and toxins—pathogens that can be harmful or even fatal. Students learn which contaminants have the greatest health risks and how they enter the food supply. While food supply contaminants can be identified from cultures grown in labs, bioengineers are creating technologies to make the detection of contaminated food quicker, easier and more effective.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Adherent-invasive E. coli, or AIEC, are bacteria that are abnormally abundant in the gut of individuals with Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory disease that affects the lining of the gastrointestinal tract. To determine whether targeting AIEC could help relieve symptoms of Crohn’s disease, researchers recently explored the possibility of simply making these bacteria less sticky. The team applied a compound known as TAK-018 to gut samples gathered from patients. TAK-018 binds to the bacterial adhesin FimH, blocking bacteria clinging and interaction with cells along the intestinal wall. Tests revealed that TAK-018 not only prevented AIEC bacteria from adhering to intestinal tissue but also reduced inflammation, helping preserve the integrity of this important barrier. While more work is needed to understand how TAK-018 operates in the body, the drug is known to be safe and well-tolerated in patients and is currently undergoing phase II testing for the treatment of Crohn’s disease..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This lab will reinforce the experimental design process while also learning about nanomaterials such as colloidal silver.  

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Researchers at the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science have developed a new genetic pathway that can be used to co-opt E. coli bacteria to produce maleate, one of the most important industrial chemicals in use today. A chief component in the coatings of substances like nylon and galvanized steel and an important stabilizing agent in pharmaceuticals, maleate is typically produced through harsh treatments of crude oil. But by using genetically engineered microorganisms to produce maleate, the researchers have developed a much more sustainable approach. Maleate is the end product of a complex chemical reaction. Bacteria don’t normally come equipped with machinery to power this reaction, so the researchers had to design a ground-up approach before they could start harvesting maleate. This required careful analysis of the intermediates needed for maleate synthesis and the identification of genes that could help E. coli make each of these molecules..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"RhoB is a rescue enzyme activated by toxins, stress, and inflammation and has been found to enhance the clearance of UTI-causing E. coli. Given these roles, researchers wondered whether RhoB might be a useful signal of other diseases—namely, ulcerative colitis. To find out, the team examined colon tissue from patients with ulcerative colitis, as well as mice with drug-induced colitis. They discovered that RhoB was enhanced in both humans and mice, with gut microbes contributing to that increase. Unlike in other studies, here RhoB was found to play an antagonistic role: compared with control mice (WT), colitis tended to recede in mice with low RhoB (RhoB-/-). A similar trend was observed in organs artificially grown from the tissue of mice without the gene that codes for RhoB. In these RhoB-less organoids, cells showed an increased ability to repair colon tissue compared with tissue from untreated control mice..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Fundamentals of Biology focuses on the basic principles of biochemistry, molecular biology, genetics, and recombinant DNA. These principles are necessary to understanding the basic mechanisms of life and anchor the biological knowledge that is required to understand many of the challenges in everyday life, from human health and disease to loss of biodiversity and environmental quality.
Course Format

This course has been designed for independent study. It consists of four units, one for each topic. The units can be used individually or in combination. The materials for each unit include:

Lecture Videos by MIT faculty.
Learning activities, including Interactive Concept Quizzes, designed to reinforce main concepts from lectures.
Problem Sets you do on your own and check your answers against the Solutions when you're done.
Problem Solving Video help sessions taught by experienced MIT Teaching Assistants.
Lists of important Terms and Definitions.
Suggested Topics and Links for further study.
Exams with Solution Keys.

Content Development

Eric Lander
Robert Weinberg
Tyler Jacks
Hazel Sive
Graham Walker
Sallie Chisholm
Dr. Michelle Mischke

Build a gene network! The lac operon is a set of genes which are responsible for the metabolism of lactose in some bacterial cells. Explore the effects of mutations within the lac operon by adding or removing genes from the DNA.

Build a gene network! The lac operon is a set of genes which are responsible for the metabolism of lactose in some bacterial cells. Explore the effects of mutations within the lac operon by adding or removing genes from the DNA.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Fecal microbiota transplantation is a promising procedure for preventing recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (rCDI), which is the most frequently identified healthcare-associated infection in the US. Unfortunately, the effects of microbiota transplantations on the microbiome and resistome of rCDI patients have not been examined in detail. To address that gap, researchers recently conducted a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of the investigational microbiota therapeutic RBX2660 for patients with rCDI. Over the first 7 days after treatment, all patients showed significant recovery of gut microbiome architecture and a decreased abundance of antibiotic-resistance genes. However, patients receiving RBX2660 showed more significant and longer-lasting microbiome and resistome shifts toward a balanced configuration than those receiving the placebo..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Could doctors one day prescribe electrical stimulation to fight a bacterial infection? Work by an interdisciplinary team of researchers at AIMES suggests that might be possible. In line with the Goals of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda, researchers at AIMES are dedicated to promoting “Good Health and Well-Being” by achieving a better understanding of bacterial infections and the body’s defenses against them. Some of their latest findings reveal a new aspect of host–pathogen interactions. In addition to the cascade of chemical signals that are activated when bacteria invade, the body might also conduct electrical signals across nerves—enabling the infected organ to call distant parts of the body to action. The team uncovered this form of “biological telecommunication” by studying rats with kidney infections caused by strains of E. coli. Within as little as 4 hours of infection, they could detect an immune response all the way in the spleen..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Trendy health foods are taking off in the United States, but one new trend may do more harm than good. Unpasteurized, or “raw,” milk is purported to have probiotic health benefits. Unfortunately, despite the proposed benefits, contamination with pathogenic bacteria has occurred. and little is known about the extent of antibiotic-resistant microbes present in raw milk sold at retail stores. A new study evaluated the microbiomes of cow's milk samples using DNA sequencing and metagenomics. including over 2,000 retail milk samples from 5 states – both raw milk and milk pasteurized in different ways. Raw milk samples had the highest prevalence of viable bacteria, with Pseudomonadaceae dominating. Probiotic lactic acid bacteria levels were limited in raw milk, and storage outside of a refrigerator dramatically increased bacterial populations expressing antibiotic-resistance genes..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Student teams practice water quality analysis through turbidity measurement and coliform bacteria counts. They use information about water treatment processes to design prototype small-scale water treatment systems and test the influent (incoming) and effluent (outgoing) water to assess how well their prototypes produce safe water to prevent water-borne illnesses.

This textbook has evolved from online and live-in-person lectures presented in Professor Kenneth Todar's bacteriology courses at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Its contents are suitable for reading or presentation in courses or course modules concerning general microbiology and medical bacteriology at the college and advanced high school levels of education. For teachers, instructional materials are available that accompany many chapters and topics. These include lecture outlines, notes, powerpoint presentations, and examination questions that compose a study guide

How can you tell if harmful bacteria are growing in your food? Students learn to culture bacteria in order to examine ground meat and bagged salad samples, looking for common foodborne bacteria such as E. coli or salmonella. After 2-7 days of incubation, they observe and identify the resulting bacteria. Based on their first-hand experiences conducting this conventional biological culturing process, they consider its suitability in meeting society's need for ongoing detection of harmful bacteria in its food supply, leading them to see the need for bioengineering inventions for rapid response bio-detection systems.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Colitis and other diarrheal diseases cause serious health problems in dairy calves and are often managed by antibiotics. But heavy agricultural antibiotic use is a major driver of the global antibiotic resistance crisis, meaning there is a need for non-antibiotic therapeutics. One such potential therapeutic is ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA) or its common formulation, ursodiol. UDCA is a bile acid with previously demonstrated effectiveness treating colitis but an unclear mechanism of action. In a multipronged study, researchers examined the microbiome and metabolic profiles of healthy and diarrheic calves and tested the impacts of UDCA and ursodiol in cell culture and mouse models. A core set of gut bacterial groups distinguished healthy calves from diarrheic ones and those beneficial groups were associated with microbial UDCA production, short-chain fatty acids, and other prebiotics. Further, in several cell culture and mouse models, ursodiol administration blocked bacterial growth and invasion..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.