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French Road Sampling Trip Saves Sorcerer II From More Rough Weather!
September 28th 2010 With one last sample to collect and the weather still rough in the Mediterranean, we made the decision to make the Banyuls sample a road sampling trip. So Jeremy and I loaded up a rental car with carboys and headed out at 5 am to drive the 125 miles (200km) to Banyuls France from Barcelona Spain. Driving to Banyuls After being on the boat for a few months straight, the 2 hour drive was a welcome adventure, even with the 5 am departure! We were...
Go To Greece!
September 20th 2010 We arrived in Crete today, bringing our Greek sampling leg to an end. We were very lucky to be able to sail in Greek waters, this place is truly beautiful. Not only did we get to see the natural beauty of Greece, but our hosts introduced us to the rich culture and extensive history of Greece. Our hosts, The Captain (AKA Mr Panayotis Tsakos ) and his family have been good friends with Dr. Venter for years. Being in the shipping business for decades, it isn’t surprising...
Back To Sampling In The Black Sea and Rough Rough Weather
September 9th 2010 Hello everyone! I know it has been a long time since the last post from Sorcerer II. Let me take the time to explain…………..in early August we sailed to Greece. As I have mentioned in the past we have permits with each country to collect samples, these permits have certain time windows and other country specific stipulations. Once stipulation on the Greek permit was that for each Greek sample collected we must have a Greek collaborator onboard Sorcerer II. One of...
Entamoeba histolytica research presented at the Molecular Parasitology Meeting
Entamoeba histolytica causes invasive intestinal and extraintestinal infections, known as amoebiasis, in about 50 million people and still remains a significant cause of human death in developing countries. However, for unknown reasons, fewer than 10% of E. histolytica infections are symptomatic (causing symptoms such as diarrhea, dysentery or liver abscess). The J. Craig Venter Institute is among the institutions awarded the NIAID Genome Sequencing Centers for Infectious Diseases (GSCID)...
Italy: Sites and Sailing
Saturday July 31st When I last wrote we had finished our 10 day sampling window in Italian waters. On Wednesday July 21st we arrived in Rome the same day Dr. Venter, Heather Kowalski, and Darwin the super boat dog had flown in from the states. We spent 3 days in Rome, most of the time was spent doing media events, restocking the boat with supplies and trying to see as much as Rome as possible in our spare time. On the night of July 23rd we set sail to make our way down the coast of Italy,...
10 Days of Italian Sampling Coming to a Close
Tuesday July 20th On July 16th we finished our Straits of Messina sampling and headed into the Ionian and Adriatic Seas. We sailed overnight and collected our Ionian Sea sample, we continued northeast and on July 18th we collected our Adriatic Sea sample. After we collected the Adriatic Sea sample we turned around and headed back to the Straits of Messina to resample the south entrance on July 19th. We proceeded through the straits...
Media Day Circus On Sorcerer II
June 23nd On Monday June 21st we announced the official start of the Mediterranean leg of the Sorcerer II Global Ocean Sampling Expedition. Dr. Venter took time from his busy schedule to fly into Valencia and attend the event as well as representatives from The Life Technology Foundation. The first part of the day was dedicated to media (newspapers, radio and T.V.), which included local Valencia and national outlets from Madrid. For more on press information please click here, on the linked...
Genomics of the Indoor Air Environment
Most of our life is spent in indoors, well-buffered from the constant changes in temperature, humidity, wind and light which shape life outside our homes and offices. It seems intuitive that the types of microorganisms which inhabit our indoor environment must be different from those on the outside; after all, by removing environmental stresses such as UV, dessication and wind, we eliminate selective pressures on populations.We spend 23 hours a day indoors, but we know very little about the...
The Great Blizzard Sample of Lake Redon!
May15th 2010 We decided to do the 3 lakes in the Banyoles area first because the weather in the Pyrenees was so bad that we wouldn't have been able to get up the mountain to sample Lake Redon. Lake Redon is a pristine Alpine lake that is sampled weekly by Spanish researchers. On Tuesday May 11th the weather prediction for the next few days in the Pyrenees said clear skies, so we loaded up the van and Chris, Emilio, Maria and myself took off on the 341 kilometer (211 miles) drive. Route...
Influences of trace metals on biological evolution
Scientists show how trace metal chemistry and global changes in oxygen have influenced the evolution of metalloproteins and the Eukaryotes A paper is being published in PNAS this week about how the varying abundance of trace metals in the environment has influenced biological evolution. The research team, led by Chris Dupont of the J. Craig Venter Institute and Gustavo Caetano-Anollés at the University of Illinois, correlated environmental changes in metal availability over the past 3...