Cornell researchers have found a new species of soil bacteria – which they named in memory of the Cornell professor who first discovered it – that is particularly adept at breaking down organic matter, including the cancer-causing chemicals that are released when coal, gas, oil and refuse are burned.
Cornell researchers have found a new species of soil bacteria – which they named in memory of the Cornell professor who first discovered it – that is particularly adept at breaking down organic matter, including the cancer-causing chemicals that are released when coal, gas, oil and refuse are burned.
“Microbes have been here since life began, almost 4 billion years. They created the system that we live in, and they sustain it,” said Dan Buckley, professor of microbial ecology in the Section of Soil and Crop Sciences in the School of Integrative Plant Science. “We may not see them, but they’re running the show.”
Buckley and five other Cornell researchers, along with colleagues from Lycoming College, described the new bacterium in a paper, “Paraburkholderia madseniana sp. nov., a phenolic acid-degrading bacterium isolated from acidic forest soil,” published Feb. 6 in the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology.
The new bacteria, madseniana, is named to honor the late Gene Madsen, the microbiology professor who started the research. He died in 2017, before he could confirm the discovery.
Read more at Cornell University
Image: David Karasz ’20 prepares cultures of Paraburkholderia for scanning electron microscopy to identify cellular structures involved in chain formation. CREDIT: Allison Usavage/Cornell University
