Bacteria are very useful in life: they can be helpful in ridding ourselves of wastes, in biomining, and in mosquito manipulation. The most interesting of these uses seems to be the fact that we can use bacteria to fight malaria. A bacterium by the name of Wolbachia can help prevent the spread of malaria, as described in 2006. This article (http://malaria.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_WTX035357.html) is not as recent as I would prefer it to be, so I will come back to this topic later for some deeper research. The infection is spread through the maternal line (from mother to daughter), and has some really interesting effects on insects. Wolbachia kills male two-spot ladybirds (which looks like a ladybug, except with only two spots), and the surviving females will eat the bodies of their dead brothers. In woodlice, the males turn into females (this is an interesting outcome). I don’t really have time right now to finish everything I would like to write on this post, so I will add on to it later. Visit back again soon for a detailed study on the effects of Wolbachia on insects!
(Another site I may find useful in the future is http://www.bacteriamuseum.org/cms/Bacteria/applied-bacteriology-use-of-bacteria-in-industry.html, which has an explanation of some areas in the study of bacteriology.)
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