Distinguished Professor of Molecular Biology and Microbiology, Emeritus, at Tufts University School of Medicine; the author of In the Company of Mushrooms and numerous books on microbiology and disease, and has published in FUNGI a few times over the years. For anyone wanting to learn more


about—and visualize—the microbes of the world around us, Life at the Edge of Sight is THE book to get. Te book is written for general audiences with no real prior knowledge of microbes, though basic knowledge of, and a curiosity for, biology will be helpful. Anyone high school-aged and above would be enthralled. Microbes are pretty. All of a sudden microbes are cool! Microbes create medicines, filter wastewater, and clean pollution. Tey give cheese funky flavors, wines complex aromas, and bread a nutty crumb. Microbes have been harnessed to increase crop yields and promote human health. Life at the Edge of Sight is a stunning visual exploration of the inhabitants of an invisible world, from the pioneering findings of a seventeenth- century visionary to magnificent close-ups of the inner workings and cooperative communities of Earth’s most prolific organisms. Using cutting-edge imaging


technologies, Scott Chimileski and Roberto Kolter lead readers through breakthroughs and unresolved questions scientists hope microbes will answer soon. Tey explain how microbial studies have clarified the origins of life on Earth, guided thinking about possible life on other planets, unlocked evolutionary mechanisms, and helped explain the functioning of complex ecosystems. Tey even include an appendix at the end of the book on how to photograph microbes. Life at the Edge of Sight opens a beautiful new frontier for readers to explore through images and tales. We learn that there is more microbial biodiversity on a single frond of duckweed floating in a Delft canal than the diversity of plants and animals that biologists find in tropical rainforests. Colonies with millions of microbes can produce an array of pigments that put an artist’s palette to shame. Te microbial world is ancient and ever-changing, buried in fossils and driven by cellular


reactions operating in quadrillionths of a second. All other organisms have evolved within this universe of microbes, yielding intricate beneficial symbioses. We pay a visit to Celia Taxter’s garden in Maine—this is the childhood haunt of famed mycologist Roland Taxter who went on to described numerous strange and wonderous fungi. We learn how it is that plasmodial slime molds seek out food sources—and move entirely from exhausted substrates. We learn—and see—within layers of bacterial biofilms, discovering that within these layers are different niches for microbes to exploit. (“Different microbes adapt to live at different places within a biofilm much as animals and plants adapt to specific zones in a rainforest, from the innermost regions to the towering canopies.”) Tis applies to so many other microbial habitats that the authors tour with us, including soils, layers within a single lichen thallus, and a wheel of blue cheese, from the slimy rind down into the deep blue veins brimming with Penicillium roqueforti. With two experts as guides, the invisible microbial world awaits in plain sight. Some of the tales in Life at the Edge


of Sight will confound you and may even confound the very definition of what a microbe is. Tere are symbiotic microbes which you no doubt have heard of; there are microbes that live socially (in many ways like ants and humans) that you likely have not heard of. Within biofilms and swarms of cells, older damaged bacterial cells may be rejuvenated through interaction with younger cells. Tere are many bacteria and fungi discussed; as well as organisms that seem to exist between those two realms like actinomycetes and myxobacteria. Tere are “giant bacterial cells that dwarf the smallest known animals.” (Huh?!) Many viruses are larger than bacteria … and one is known to be larger even than the smallest free-living Eukaryote. (Wait … what?!) Te authors even touch on what it means to be “free- living” and how microbes don’t always conform to our definitions. One marine bacterium, Prochlorococcus, has a mere 2,000 genes in its genome (this is very small, as organisms go). Stranger still, this free-living bacterium (it never forms biofilms or colonies, etc.) only maintains about 1,000 genes per cell; the rest of its genome is spread over many other


Winter 2022 FUNGI Volume 15:1 55


members in the sea. If an individual is lacking genes to perform a certain task, it must obtain them from others of its kind. Stranger still, Prochlorococcus no longer has the gene for catalase enzyme and instead must rely on another, distantly related bacterium for this. And this is only scratching the surface of Life at the Edge of Sight. Te tales of these authors, and their microbes, go even deeper. -Britt A. Bunyard


FUNGI


Visit us online to subscribe–DIGITAL, PRINT or BOTH!


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60