For decades, textbooks and public-health campaigns repeated a striking claim: bacterial cells in the human body outnumber human cells by a factor of ten to one. That figure, repeated so often it ...

A common claim holds that the human body contains ten times as many bacterial cells as human ones, a striking figure repeated in textbooks and popular science for decades. It turns out to be wrong. A ...

Our gut is a bustling hub of activity, home to trillions of microbes that work together with our bodies to keep us healthy. A recent study explores one fascinating aspect of this partnership: how gut ...

In a recent study published in the journal PLOS Biology, researchers adapt a strain of human body lice to a membrane feeder to study its infection dynamics with Yersinia pestis, the causative agent of ...

Thriving alongside trillions of bacteria in the human digestive tract is a vast population of viruses. Ever since one such ...

Researchers have found that nine species of gut bacteria can help remove forever chemicals from the body, rapidly absorbing PFAS linked to cancer and other serious illnesses. “This uncovers a new ...

Bacteria use multiple defense mechanisms to survive in the host body. Shigella bacteria that cause colitis disable multiple host defense pathways using three specialized effector proteins, as reported ...

Antibiotics are a double-edged sword—they should be as toxic as possible to pathogenic bacteria while being harmless to the cells of the human body. An international research team led by the Helmholtz ...

Scientists have discovered that bacteria living in human blood produce powerful anti-aging compounds that protect skin cells from damage and inflammation. The research, published in the Journal of ...

Microbiologists have discovered how two bacterial species move through the human body by “hitching a ride” on immune cells. The organisms in question are: Francisella tularensis, which causes the ...

Scientists have discovered that gut bacteria can feed on the protective mucus lining your intestines, producing potentially ...

Staphylococcus aureus, or S. aureus, is a leading cause of staph infections, including antibiotic-resistant MRSA. As these infections become harder to treat, researchers are looking for new ways to ...