10 Ways Microorganisms Make Your Life Waaay Better
What would we do without you, little guys!?
By Mary Ann R
Microorganisms, or microbes as they’re also known, are… you guessed it: microscopic organisms!
This includes bacteria, fungi, viruses….
...as well as teeny tiny plants and animals.
These guys usually get a bad rap for, you know, causing diseases, infections, that funky smell when you leave food in the fridge too long...
But they also are responsible for loads of useful things that make our lives, and our world, much better! Here are but a few of them:
1. Fermenting foods
We have yeast to thank for the recent lockdown-sourdough craze! Yeast is the microbe responsible for making some breads (like sourdough) rise. The yeast undergoes fermentation in the foods, breaking down sugar to produce carbon dioxide - the gas that inflates the bread from the inside. The same process is also responsible for making beer and wine alcoholic!
2. Blue cheese!!
Source: Intsagram: @foodaroundtheworld__ url: https://www.instagram.com/p/CDiJ759JPmC/
Ok, so not everyone likes blue cheese... But on the topic of wine and bread, this glamorous food deserves an honorable mention! The blue streaks are actually a fungus - Penicillium roqueforti - growing inside the cheese. But don’t let that put you off - of course, it’s totally harmless to consume.
3. Making medicines
If you thought you’d heard of Penicillium before, you’d be right! Some members of the genus produce the widely-used antibiotic penicillin.
But it's not just fungi that have medical uses, many bacteria produce useful chemicals, and are used in medical research. Even viruses are widely used to study and potentially treat disease, acting as mini delivery units taking modified genes into cells!
4. Digestion
Microbes also keep you healthy from the inside, where there are trillions(!) living inside you. The ‘gut microbiome’ is made up of all the bacteria, viruses and fungi that live inside your digestive tract, and help your body break down and absorb the nutrients you need to survive.
There’s even research to suggest the gut microbiome has effects on other aspects of your health, such as immunity, cancer and even mental health!
5. Healthy skin
The gut isn’t the only part of the body with a thriving microbe population - your skin has its own microbiome too! Too much or too little of certain types of microbes can negatively affect your skin, and may even be responsible for dandruff.
6. Natural beauty
Credit: Jordan Robins Photography
You might not think of microbes as being beautiful, especially when they’re infesting your wounds or food, but these little critters are responsible for some of the most breathtakingly beautiful natural sights this world has to offer! This blue sea glow is caused by dinoflagellates, marine microorganisms.
7. Decomposing dead matter
Whilst we’re talking about making the world a more beautiful place, let’s not forget that microorganisms are responsible for breaking down dead things! Which world would you rather live in, one where all corpses remain intact forever and ever, or one where microbes take care of it for us, like they were never there? That’s what I thought…
8. Doing the laundry
Ok, so you can’t actually get microbes to do your laundry for you, but they certainly do help! Biological laundry detergents contain bacterial enzymes that help break down stubborn stains like food and blood. Bacteria can also be used to develop sustainable natural clothing dyes.
9. Natural pesticides
Credit: Quinto Sapore (Italy)
Disease-causing microorganisms are always a bad thing, right? Wrong! These microbes can be used to repel, harm or kill the pests that feed on farmers’ crops, including insects, weeds and harmful fungi. Using microbes is a natural alternative to using chemicals on crops, and can be used to produce organic foods.
10. Sustainable futures
Microbes are fascinating, and the scientific community is learning more about them every day. The more we learn, the more potential uses we uncover. Harnessing the power of microbes can help us build a more sustainable and climate-friendly world. Cars running on microbe fuel? Not such a far-fetched idea anymore.