Introduction to Environmental Microbiology

1. Introduction to Environmental Microbiology Course: Companion Site for Environmental Microbiology Instructor: Maier

2. Chapter 1 - Lecture Objectives: • Understand course objectives and how to obtain the grade you want • Recall some of the names of your classmates and your instructor • Locate course materials on the web • Define Environmental Microbiology and articulate its relevance to the human race

3. Environmental Microbiology – definition The study of microbial fate and activity in air, water and soil, and the resulting impact on human health and welfare. Microbial Ecology – definition The science that explores interrelationships between organisms and their living and abiotic environment Driving force behind Environmental Microbiology: How can we harness the understanding of environmental microbes to benefit society? Introduction to Environmental Microbiology Compare with:

4. Important Events Leading to Environmental Microbiology A Historical Perspective • A) Ancient History • 1676 Antonie van Leeuwenhoek • - 1st microscope “animalcules” 1830-1900 Louis Pasteur - rejected theory of spontaneous generation - demonstrated presence of microbes in air 1856-1953 Sergei Winogradski - “Father” of Soil Microbiology - nitrification, autotrophy 1843-1910 Robert Koch – Nobel Prize - pure culture technique - Koch’s postulates: a specific organism causes a specific process (e.g., disease)

5. B) 20th Century 1928 Griffith - bacterial genetics - transformation 1952 Selman Waksman - Principles of Soil Microbiology - Discovery of streptomycin (Nobel Prize) 1953 Watson and Crick - Structure of DNA (Nobel Prize) 1985 Kary Mullis - Polymerase Chain Reaction (Nobel Prize) "Beginning with a single molecule of the genetic material DNA, the PCR can generate 100 billion similar molecules in an afternoon. The reaction is easy to execute. It requires no more than a test tube, a few simple reagents and a source of heat. The DNA sample that one wishes to copy can be pure, or it can be a minute part of an extremely complex mixture of biological materials. The DNA may come from a hospital tissue specimen, from a single human hair, from a drop of dried blood at the scene of a crime, from the tissues of a mummified brain or from a 40,000-year-old wooly mammoth frozen in a glacier." C) The Next Millenium “Bioinformatics”

6. Modern Environmental Microbiology Soil microbiology Aquatic microbiology Hazardous waste/bioremediation Water quality Food safety Aeromicrobiology Occupational health/infection control Diagnostic microbiology Biotechnology Industrial microbiology