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Noah Fierer

@noahfierer.bsky.social

2.6K followers 200 following 84 posts

Microbial ecologist https://www.fiererlab.org/

www.fiererlab.org

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Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Aug 6

New preprint led by Matt Gebert focused on the environmental reservoirs of nontuberculous mycobacterial (NTM) pathogens. NTM disease is environmentally acquired, but routes of exposure unclear. Our work implicates premise plumbing as the main culprit! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

A cross-environment comparison of nontuberculous mycobacterial diversity

Nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) are a group of environmental bacteria that encompass nearly 200 described species, some of which can cause chronic pulmonary infection in humans. What makes these inf...

www.biorxiv.org

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 28

After 15 years, the authors of the infamous 'arsenic life' paper are still trying to argue that their findings are legit and not just a product of 'major errors'? Unbelievable. The authors' response to the retraction is infuriating. Time to let it go. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

www.science.org

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

We hope the approach and our draft 'periodic table' are useful and encourage future efforts to systematically characterize trait variance across the bacterial tree of life.(6/6)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

Perhaps more importantly, the workflow for generating the 'periodic table' is adaptable so it can ultimately be expanded to incorporate additional traits/taxa (5/6).

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

Our draft 'periodic table' of bacterial diversity, like the periodic table of the elements, provides a interpretable & concise way to visualize and explore bacterial diversity in trait space (see Figs 4-5) - linking phylogeny to trait distributions in a quantifiable manner (4/6)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

Here we focused on 6 traits - inferring those traits (including autotrophy, O2 tolerance, phototrophy, etc.) using genome-based models across >50,000 bacterial 'species' (thanks @ace-gtdb.bsky.social!) (3/6)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

Work was motivated by the challenges associated with linking taxonomic/phylogenetic information to knowledge of what we know (or think we know) about bacterial traits (2/6)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 18

New pre-print from my group - project led by PhD student Michael Hoffert. We set out on a daunting mission to generate a 'periodic table' of bacterial diversity (1/6) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

A periodic table of bacteria?: Mapping bacterial diversity in trait space

Bacterial diversity can be overwhelming. There is an ever-expanding number of bacterial taxa being discovered, but many of these taxa remain uncharacterized with unknown traits and environmental prefe...

www.biorxiv.org

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jul 14

I agree with both of these papers. Given that they were published >10 years ago, why is the 'hologenome' concept still a thing?

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jun 25

See Table 1 of this paper: bmcbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Reagent and laboratory contamination can critically impact sequence-based microbiome analyses - BMC Biology

Background The study of microbial communities has been revolutionised in recent years by the widespread adoption of culture independent analytical techniques such as 16S rRNA gene sequencing and metag...

bmcbiol.biomedcentral.com

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jun 24

Correct - if you filtered a few liters of your saliva for DNA extraction, you would undoubtedly have far far higher DNA yields than a few liters of household water

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Jun 21

Hope this is useful - consensus statement "Guidelines for preventing and reporting contamination in low-biomass microbiome studies" rdcu.be/er3Io

Guidelines for preventing and reporting contamination in low-biomass microbiome studies

Nature Microbiology - In this Consensus Statement, the authors outline strategies for processing, analysing and interpreting low-biomass microbiome samples, and provide recommendations to minimize...

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 30

New study out - we developed a pipeline for targeted assembly of genomes from (complex) soil metagenomes to examine the strain-level diversity and ecology of a dominant soil bacterial genus (Bradyrhizobium). Feedback appreciated. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Continent-wide assessment of the strain-level diversity of Bradyrhizobium, a dominant soil bacterial genus

Global surveys of soil bacteria have identified several taxa that are nearly ubiquitous and often the most abundant members of soil bacterial communities. However, it remains unclear why these taxa ar...

www.biorxiv.org

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 21

This is cool - bacteria wrap their flagella to propel themselves through narrow passages www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Bacteria break through one-micrometer-square passages by flagellar wrapping

Confined spaces are omnipresent in the micro-environments, including soil aggregates and intestinal crypts, yet little is known about how bacteria behave under such conditions where movement is challe...

www.biorxiv.org

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 8

Just your regular reminder that 'sterile' doesn't mean 'DNA-free'! (this rant brought to you by yet another published DNA-based study conducted in a low biomass system where appropriate controls do not appear to have been included)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 7

Excellent work (and very well-written)

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 7

Dear fellow olds - recognize that the term 'next generation sequencing' is confusing to those that never had experience with the first generation. Also - what 'generation' are we on anyways?

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · May 1

This looks awesome. Open to PhD students from the US?

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Apr 29

👆 Yes. 100% agreed.

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Apr 20

So happy it is still winter here in Colorado

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Apr 14

Might be a useful alternative: www.arb-silva.de/aligner/

Alignment, Classification and Tree Service

Align your 16S rRNA sequences using the SINA alignment tool.

www.arb-silva.de

Reposted by Noah Fierer

Julian Resasco @julianresasco.bsky.social · Apr 3

Excited to share PhD student Claire Winfrey’s (w/ @noahfierer.bsky.social & me) new paper in @esajournals.bsky.social Ecology! She examines how edge effects in habitat fragments shape soil microbial communities. Check it out 🦠 🧪 🌎 esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

The figure shows study sites at the Savannah River Site in SC, USA, and the edge transects used in the study.

This is a multipanel figure showing bacteria/archaea and fungi turnover across edge transects in different blocks with pH and canopy cover.

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Mar 17

New study out from my group showing how the volatile geosmin (the wonderful 'smell of dirt') serves as a cue to influence the behavior of soil protists rdcu.be/edCJj

Effects of Geosmin on the Behavior of Soil Protists

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Feb 28

See recent papers from my group, including those led by @josepramoneda.bsky.social

Noah Fierer @noahfierer.bsky.social · Feb 22

Analyses done via quantitative metabarcoding targeting plant and fungal DNA - so no human DNA info