Microbial Population Biology

For tomorrow’s lecture, you might want to give this news article a quick read:

http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.0050074

It speaks of the controversies surrounding microbial bioprospecting efforts, esp. those of Venter et al.

Another booklet that describes metagenomics and its goals and promises can be found here:

http://dels.nas.edu/dels/rpt_briefs/metagenomics_final.pdf

The complete version of the report from the National Academy of Sciences on metagenomics can be found here:

http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11902&page=12

And for your final blog posts, to be evaluated:

1) Please post your creative thoughts on either microbial bioprospecting or the evolution of flu virulence

2) When all is settled, please post your abstract of your grant proposal, which should clearly spell out your specific objectives.