Battling microbes is becoming increasingly important, since bacteria that are immune to antibiotics are now showing up in some food products.

Since cutting boards and kitchen work surfaces are common bacterial breeding grounds, it's important to carefully clean these.  Wouldn't it be nice to always count on having a microbe-free work surface?  Well, this is exactly what microbiologists are now trying to make.

This approach to microbe killing involves applying a coating that renders surfaces permanently antiseptic.  Most antibacterial treatments become ineffective when the antibacterial agent is washed away during cleaning.  This new approach involves coating the surface with large polymer molecules which are able to destroy bacteria.  While one end of the polymer coating binds to the treated surface, the other end penetrates the bacterium's cell wall and quickly kills it.  These coated surfaces even have the potential to combat air-borne bacteria released during events such as sneezing.

The advantage of this microbe killing mechanism is that bacteria will not develop resistance to it as they can to antibiotics.  It would be nice to know that the pay phone, kitchen counter and the kid's toys had surfaces with a built in ability to kill bacteria on contact.

So next time you clean the kitchen counter, look forward to the day when you'll only need to wipe off the already dead bacteria.

MOVING BEYOND MATTER
by  Debbie Hughes

Indeed, what you can't see, can hurt you.  For centuries, people did not understand the concept of germs as micro-organisms which had the ability to enter a living creature to cause sickness.  It was actually Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) who formulated the germ theory, motivated in his studies by the untimely death of his own children.

It took the scientific and medical communities time to accept the results of Pasteur, Semmelweiss and Lister, men who worked on germ theory in the fields of food, obstetrics and surgery respectively.  The society of that time resisted the idea that something that couldn't be seen, something invisible to the eye, not only existed but was indeed menacing.  Germ theory was a revolutionary concept, and lack of sight meant lack of belief.

"Doubting Thomas."  Have you ever heard that expression?  How about "Seeing is believing"?  These word pictures and truisms come from the Bible story of Thomas, a disciple who refused to believe in the resurrection of Jesus unless he could see and touch the proofs of the means of death in His body. 

Author Mark Buchanan wrote the following in his book Your God is too Safe:

"Thomas was a true skeptic.  He doubted not to excuse his unbelief, but to establish robust belief.  He doubted so that his belief might be based on something more than rumor and wishful thinking...

"Doubt, when honest, should set us on a quest for that which is true and real, for that which we can not only give intellectual assent but, more than that, can entrust our very lives to.  Thomas's doubt led to this place.  Jesus shows His wounds to Thomas, tells Thomas to see, to touch. He sees, but he doesn't touch.  He knows when enough is enough.  And here is the real sign that Thomas is not some poseur, some mere academic trend chaser:  His seeing gives way, not just to belief, but to worship..."