To celebrate the launch of Biosphere, we invite you to join our conversation about some new beginnings in the microbial world and in our scientific paths.
We often think that the birth of live young is a special characteristic of some animals. Mammals do it, some sharks do it, and it would totally make sense if no single-celled microorganisms did it. But that is not the case! We talk about one such exception, the bacterium Epulopiscium fishelsoni that lives in the guts of Regal Tangs, such as Dory the Fish. E. fishelsoni nurture little baby cells inside of the parent cell until the babies grow up, explode their parent, and move on to bigger and better things. Epulopiscium roughly translates to “guest at a fish’s banquet.” Find out in this episode if this is a banquet that you want to join!
To address new beginnings in research, Aditi, John, Julian, and Lev discuss their very different experiences starting in science. For one of us, this involved a difficult choice between sea sponges and human disease. For another—lots and lots of spiders. Tune in to hear our stories.
You can learn about the discovery of E. fishelsoni in the New York Times. For more about bacteria giving birth to live young and reproducing in other weird ways, check out this research from Cornell University.
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The cover image is CC-BY SA 4.0. Not only charismatic movie stars, Regal Tangs house a lot of wonderful biology.