Scientists found a method for the "green" production of the important starting material for the chemical industry

29-May-2020

Sometimes potentially useful enzymes are not easy to discover because their biocatalytic capabilities may go beyond their natural and thus known range of action. By recombining a newly discovered enzymatic capability, a research team from the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology led ...

more

By coupling a bacterial injection system with a light-controlled molecular switch, scientists are able to inject proteins into eukaryontic cells

15-May-2020

When bacteria such as Salmonella or Yersinia cause fever, diarrhoea or abdominal pain, tiny "injection needles" are at work: their type 3 secretion system, or T3SS for short, shoots bacterial virulence proteins directly into the eukaryotic host cells. Researchers have thought of using bacterial ...

more

New insights into collective movement of bacteria

20-Dec-2019

Not only birds, fish and even crowds of people show collective movement patterns, motile bacteria also form currents and vortices when their cell density exceeds a certain size. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg have now been able to show how swarm ...

more

A marine pathogenic bacterium forms specialized cells for dissemination

29-Oct-2019

Vibrio parahaemolyticus can be found in the tidal zones in estuarine areas. The marine bacterium causes acute gastroenteritis in humans and is the leading cause for seafood borne illnesses in the world. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg, Germany, ...

more

Scientists reveal the features of efficient carboxylase enzymes

12-Jul-2019

In order to overcome the climate crisis, two measures are required: The reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and removal of CO2 from the earth atmosphere. The latter is the goal of Tobias Erb's research group at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg. Their ...

more