"I was standing there looking at a bucket of moldy bananas next to a bucket of bananas with no mold"

posted Oct 27, 2015 at 4:17 PM

Here's an interesting look at a potential countermeasure to White Nose Syndrome, the bat fungal infection first identified in a cave here in Albany County that's now popped up in caves all over the eastern United States, wiping out bat populations along the way. The potential agent is a fungus-inhibiting compound emitted by a bacterium that was noticed because of its effect on bananas (that is, the fruit wasn't getting moldy). Researchers at Georgia State are now in the early stages of testing it with bats, with promising results so far.

Oh, and DEC would like to remind you to not disturb hibernating bats.

[Nature] [White Nose Symdrome.org [NYS DEC] (Thanks, Tim)

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