DOES YOUR STATE HAVE AN OFFICIAL MICROBE?

So what is microbe? Another term is microorganism, those tiny living things too small to be seen by the naked eye. Is a virus a microbe? Yes. Is it alive? That remains debatable. As we have recently been overcome by just one, COVID-19, thought I'd deviate from the script and say few more things about viruses:

Is the smallest of microbes.
Walter Reed discovered the first human virus, a yellow fever virus, in 1901. He proved that this ailment was transmitted by the bite of a mosquito. That hospital in the DC area is named after him.
500 million rhinoviruses (cause the common cold) could fit on the head of a pin.

There are ten viruses for every bacterium or archaeon.
However, viruses are 1000 times smaller than bacteria or archaea.
Some of you might not have previously heard of archaea, for Carl Woese only discovered it in 1977.
Antonio van Leeuwenhoek discovered bacteria in 1676.
As this is science day, a few more bits of info about bacteria and archaea.

They are about the same size and have about equal numbers on Planet Earth. They form two of the three domains of life (and that should be kiNgdoms).

There are 10 to the 31st power viruses, 10 million times more than all the stars out there.
Virology Blog says that: IF YOU LINED UP END TO END ALL THESE VIRUSES, IT WOULD STRETCH OUT 200 MILLION LIGHT YEARS. The diameter of our Milky Way Galaxy is only 100,000 light years.
You think that is incredible?

Line up end to end, all the bacteria on this tiny planet, and that tower would stretch out 10 billion light years...about from here to the edge of the universe!

While the name virus was coined from the Latin for slimy liquid or poison, there is such a thing as a good virus. 380 trillion of them live on and in you. Ten times the number of bacteria.

Where was I? Oh, a new interest area is beginning to invade our state legislatures.

The first state to declare an Official State Microbe, in 2013, was Oregon, which chose Saccharomyces cerevisiae (brewer's or baker's yeast).

New Jersey was next in 2019 with Streptomyces griseus. Why? It was discovered in heavily manured soil. So what? It is the first antibiotic active against tuberculosis. Albert Schatz first isolated streptomycin in 1943 from Streptomyces griseus. He did this while a PhD student at The State University of Rutgers, which of course is in New Jersey. His major professor, Selman Waksman, who not only won a Nobel Prize in 1952 because of this discovery, but was sued by Schatz for not sharing in the royalties. Schatz won.

In 2021, Penicillium rubens NRRL 1951 became the Illinois State Microbe.

We all know that Alexander Fleming in 1928 found the mold Penicillium notatum, the first antiobiotic, which helped cure penicillium.
However, during World War II, that microbe could not produce enough antibiotic cures.

A team secretly came to Illinois and developed Penicillium rubens, which solved the problem. The company that succeeded was Pfizer, then a small chemical company that had been kicking around since 1849. Yes, that same Pfizer of pandemic fame. Read this fascinating article.

That's it, only three states have an official state microbe. Here is a fairly recent article reporting on what other states are doing, but nothing else has officially been approved:

Alabama: Vibrio vulnifuics.

Alaska: Trichinella nativa, nematode worm that required you to cook bear and walrus meat to at least 160 F. Here is something you did and did not know: trichinosis is caused by a parasite called trichinella. For pork, it is Trichinella spiralis. Even today you should not consume under-cooked pork. Especially watch out for chitterlings, made from the large intestines of a pig. This problem is caused by a bacterium, Y. enterocolitica, which results in yersiniosis.
Every state is in some stage of considering a State Microbe. Learn about your state here.

My orchids just behind me (you can see my computer monitor in the background) are blooming.

The top one, of course is Honohono, which has a heavenly fragrant smell. The other one on the bottom has a coconut aroma.

A NEXT COVID SUBVARIANT?

By now most know that the Omicron BA.5 subvariant has become the dominant infectious agent, now accounting for more than 80% of all COVID-19 cases. Very few are aware that a new one, BA.4.6, is sneaking in and steadily rising, now accounting for 13% of sequenced samples . However, as BA.4.6 has emerged from BA.4, while there is uncertainty, the scientific sense is that the latest bivalent booster targeting BA.4 and BA.5 should also be effective for this next threat. One concern is that Evusheld--the only monoclonal antibody authorized for COVID prevention in immunocompromised individuals--is not effective against BA.4.6. Here is a reference as to what this means. A series of two injections is involved. Evusheld was developed by British-Swedish company AstraZeneca, and is a t ixagevimab co-packaged with cilgavimab . More recently, Los Angeles County reported on subvariant BA.2.75.2 . which Tony Fauci termed suspicious and troublesome. This strain has also been spreading in

Part 3: OUR NEXT AROUND THE WORLD ODYSSEY

Before I get into my third, and final, part of this cruise series, let me start with some more newsworthy topics. Thursday was my pandemic day for years. Thus, every so often I return to bring you up to date on the latest developments. All these subvariants derived from that Omicron variant, and each quickly became dominant, with slightly different symptoms. One of these will shock you. There has been a significant decline in the lost of taste and smell. From two-thirds of early patients to now only 10-20% show these symptoms. JN.1, now the dominant subvariant, results in mostly mild symptoms. However, once JN.1 infects some, there seem to be longer-lasting symptoms. Clearly, the latest booster helps prevent contracting Covid. A competing subvariant, BA.2.86, also known as Pirola , a month ago made a run, but JN.1 prevailed. No variant in particular, but research has shown that some of you will begin to lose hair for several months. This is caused by stress more than anythi

HONOLULU TO SEATTLE

The story of the day is Hurricane Milton, now a Category 4 at 145 MPH, with a track that has moved further south and the eye projected to make landfall just south of Sarasota. Good news for Tampa, which is 73 miles north. Milton will crash into Florida as a Category 4, and is huge, so a lot of problems can still be expected in Tampa Bay with storm surge. If the eye had crossed into the state just north of Tampa, the damage would have been catastrophic. Milton is a fast-moving storm, currently at 17 MPH, so as bad as the rainfall will be over Florida, again, a blessing. The eye will make landfall around 10PM EDT today, and will move into the Atlantic Ocean north of Palm Bay Thursday morning. My first trip to Seattle was in June of 1962 just after I graduated from Stanford University. Caught a bus. Was called the Century 21 Exposition . Also the Seattle World's Fair. 10 million joined me on a six-month run. My first. These are held every five years, and there have only been

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