bacteria

Doctors treating COVID-19 patients early in the pandemic often reached for antibiotics. But those drugs were not helpful in most cases, and overuse of antibiotics is a serious concern.

If civilizations are remembered for what they leave behind, our time might be labeled the Plastic Age. Plastic can endure for centuries. It's everywhere, even in our clothes, from polyester leisure suits to fleece jackets.A Silicon Valley startup is trying to get the plastic out of clothing and put something else in: biopolymers.

Last year, researchers reported finding 35 kinds of multi-drug-resistant bacteria in the exhaled breaths of killer whales off the San Juan Islands. Sewage treatment plants are usually effective at getting rid of bacteria — that’s their main purpose — but they fail to screen antibiotics and other pharmaceuticals from reaching otters or other aquatic organisms.