Cone Snails Might Not Seem Like Deadly Predators, Especially When You Consider How Easily A Fish Could

مقطع رائع وخاشع للقارئ يوسف ابكر من سورة التوبة (by samel945)

الشيخ عبد الباسط عبد الصمد(التكوير و سورة القدر)روعة (by theeslamcena)

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkdZ8k4VHZ4)

No bacterium is an island.

Many people think of bacteria as tiny Lone Rangers, paddling their flagellar canoes across the desolate petri dish sea. But in “the wild”, bacteria exist as complex, interwoven, constantly competing social communities.

Every scoop of soil is a battlefield of chemical chatter. Species send out molecular messages-in-a-bottle that ride the waves of diffusion to their mates. Some even thread electrical cables between neighboring cells. Now, new research has identified elaborate shared membranes that let single cells swarm as a superorganism …

Check out my latest article for Wired all about a soil bacterium named Myxococcus xanthus. It’s under everyone’s feet right now, and it has developed one of the most elaborate physical webs ever witnessed in bacteria. That’s it up top, devouring a colony of E. coli using its patented rippling wave attack.

It’s a stealth communication network that lets them hunt like a tiny wolfpack. So cool. Plus I got to use a GIF, so double win.

Once you’re done with that, check out this great TED talk from Bonnie Bassler all about how bacteria communicate.

BugsFeed: 7 bad ass organisms that can survive intracellularly in immune cells

1. Mycobacterium tuberculosis - Stops fusion!

Mycobacterium tuberculosis utilizes macrophages for its replication! (It uses the usual killer to expand it’s army :O ) How does tuberculosis bacilli survive in macrophages? M. tuberculosis has evolved a number of very effective survival strategies - It inhibits phagosome-lysosome fusion and inhibits phagosome acidification ensuring it’s survival inside the macrophage.

2. Brucella - Has chains, like Bruce Lee.

Brucella has a LPS O-chain. It ensures the Brucella containing vacuole (BCV) avoids fusion with lysosomes, prevents the deposition of complement at the bacterial surface and forms stable large clusters with MHC-II named macrodomians in the cell surface, interfering with MHC-II presentation of peptides to specific CD4+ T cells. Woah.

3. Listeria - It gets internalized in a vacuole and then runs away.

The pore-forming protein listeriolysin O mediates escape from host vacuoles. Once in the cytosol, the L. monocytogenes mediates efficient actin-based motility, thereby propelling the bacteria into neighboring cells. The cytosol is a favorable environment for listeria’s growth.

4. Mycobacterium leprae - Cholesterol and TACO!

Mycobacterium leprae is able to induce lipid droplet formation in infected macrophages. Cholesterol mediates the recruitment of TACO from the plasma membrane to the phagosome. TACO, also termed as coronin-1A (CORO1A), is a coat protein that prevents phagosome-lysosome fusion and thus degradation of mycobacteria in lysosomes. The entering of mycobacteria at cholesterol-rich domains of the plasma membrane and their subsequent uptake in TACO-coated phagosomes promotes intracellular survival.

5. Coxiella brunetti - The indestrucible

This hardy, obligate intracellular pathogen has evolved to not only survive, but to thrive, in the harshest of intracellular compartments: the phagolysosome. Following internalization, the nascent Coxiella phagosome ultimately develops into a large and spacious parasitophorous vacuole (PV) that acquires lysosomal characteristics such as acidic pH, acid hydrolases and cationic peptides, defences designed to rid the host of intruders.

6. Salmonella - TTSS

Salmonella have a specialized secretion system, termed the type III secretion system (TTSS), as well as proteins secreted by this system, are encoded in Salmonella pathogenicity island 1 (SPI1). TTSS are used by bacterial pathogens to inhibit their phagocytosis, induce eukaryotic cell death, and alter the host cell cytoskeleton. Salmonella species have at least one other TTSS encoded on SPI2 that appears to be involved in intracellular survival.

7. Human Immunodeficiency Virus - Tries to not attract attention

After infecting cells, HIV survives. Ever wondered why? It’s because the HIV protein, Nef plays a role in downregulating the expression of various proteins needed for recognition by potentially dangerous CD8 T cells. Nef lowers the surface expression of CD4, and several haplotypes of MHC-I by redirecting their transport from the trans-Golgi network. Another gene, Tat, appears to upregulate the expression of Bcl-2 during the early phase of cellular infection, increasing the likelihood that it will receive survival signals.

Many viruses can survive intracellularly, but I’ve included specifically HIV in this list because it survives in immune cells and it is an important virus to know.

For appropriate sources and references, click here.

Bacterias & Tx

Hi guys, just wanted to let you know that I did this really fast, so if there’s something wrong let me know! thanks :)

Magnified Photos of Creepy Crawlies

Colorado Potato Beetle magnified 100x. ‘As you might infer from its name, this bug loves potato crops and destroys plenty of them (and sometimes eggplant and tomato crops, too).‘

A schistosome parasite magnified 256x. This parasite ‘can penetrate the skin of people who come into contact with contaminated water. After several weeks, the parasites mature into adult worms, which live and produce eggs in blood vessels.’

‘Looks kind of like a sloth, doesn’t it? A sloth that climbs through your hair (and sometimes your eyebrows and eyelashes) laying eggs. Adult lice are just 2 to 3 mm long; this one has been magnified 200 times.’

This capture of a Bed Bug ‘shows the insect’s mouthparts, which it uses to pierce skin and drink your blood while you sleep.’

The infamous Water Bear, also known as a tardigrade, is much less adorable in real life than it is in many people’s imagination. But no matter how cute you find them, they’re indisputably badasses of nature, showing the ability to survive the vacuum of space.

See more magnified creepy crawlers at Mental_Floss

Mosquito mouthparts searching for a bloodstream. More info here.