from Fiona L. Henriquez (University of the West of Scotland, Paisley, UK) writing in Parasites and Vectors (2009) 2: 16

There is an increasing interest and awareness of the free-living amoeba, Acanthamoeba, over recent years as an opportunistic pathogen of medical importance. The publication of this book is a timely reflection of this current situation. The author is to be congratulated on the provision of such a comprehensive review of the literature concerning all aspects of Acanthamoeba research. The intention of the author was to provide an essential reference for researchers of infectious diseases. This is achieved and in addition, this book should also be beneficial to students at the university level with a specific interest in microbiology.

This book is certainly a 'must read' for all scientists interested in medical and environmental microbiology. It is a very convincing overview and foundation of what is already known about Acanthamoeba, but the literature is constantly progressing rapidly and new information is arising about this, until recently, understudied organism.

Further reading: Acanthamoeba: Biology and Pathogenesis

Labels: Acanthamoeba, amoeba, Amoebiasis, book review, books, free-living amoeba, opportunistic pathogen, parasites

Six further conferences have been added to our list at Microbiology Conferences

• December 1 - 5, 2008. International Research Conference on Huanglongbing
  Orlando, USA
  The disease of citrus fruit caused by the bacterium Candidatus spp.
• February 24 - 28, 2009. Conference on Amoebiasis
  Guanajuato, Mexico
  Amebiasis: Molecular approaches in an important but neglected disease.
• March 17 - 22, 2009. 25th Fungal Genetics Conference
  Asilomar, California, USA
  Billed as the biggest worldwide conference on genetics of filamentous fungi.
• May 3 - 6, 2009. 31st Symposium on Biotechnology for Fuels and Chemicals
  San Francisco, CA
  General and concurrent sessions, as well as two poster sessions, tabletop exhibits and social events are planned.
• June 15 - 17. SPORE2009 - Spore forming bacteria in food
  Quimper, France
  Despite investments of the food and feed industry to control contaminants in the food chain, the achievement of commercial sterility requirements has been hampered by the presence of unintended heat-resistant spores in food. Sporulated bacteria are involved in food spoilage, but also in toxin-mediated food poisoning, two phenomena that lead to high economic losses. Different evolution trends have been observed over the past two decades highlighting the urge to focus on the (re)emergence of sporeformers in food and discuss whether an adaptation or selection of sporeformers by food processes is occurring. The SPORE2009 meeting aims at presenting and discussing state of the art research and the very latest scientific developments on the theme of sporeformers in food.
• July 12 - 17, 2009. 1st International Conference on Nitrification (ICoN1)
  Louisville, Kentucky, USA
  The first International Conference on Nitrification (ICoN1) is meant to be the start of a tradition of bringing together investigators and students at all levels to discuss the most recent concepts in nitrification research. The meeting will present and discuss reports on the ecology, physiology, biochemistry, molecular genetics, genomics, metagenomics, transcriptomics and evolution of ammonia- and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria and archaea, and their roles in the nitrogen cycle.

For further details of these conferences please visit Microbiology Conferences

Labels: Amoebiasis, conference, fungi, Huanglongbing, microbiology conference, microbiology meeting, Nitrification, spore