{"id":8239,"date":"2016-12-12T16:30:09","date_gmt":"2016-12-12T20:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/?p=8239"},"modified":"2022-03-22T15:54:55","modified_gmt":"2022-03-22T19:54:55","slug":"newyorkerdunn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/","title":{"rendered":"Showerdough and Sourdough"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Rob
Rob Dunn ’97<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Rob Dunn ’97<\/strong> is at it again; it being another citizen-science project (or two). And it (or they) are the subject of a fun and wonderful piece by Nicola Twilley, “What’s Lurking in Your Showerhead,” that appears in the December 8 issue of the New Yorker<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n

Rob is an evolutionary biologist and professor at North Carolina State University. Twilley is one of 500 participants in his lab’s Showerhead Microbiome Project. Those volunteers (in Europe and the United States) swab the gunk in their showerheads and send the samples Rob’s lab. Twilley found it a tad gross, but Rob wonders if it’s a good thing–those microorganisms in our showerheads. Turns out our bodies are full of other bodies–we depend on them. In fact, those other bodies’ cells (in or on us!) may outnumber our own, making me more other than myself. Wow! Whether or not what’s in our showerheads is good (or not so good) for us remains to be tested. First we have to see what’s in there in order to ask the right questions. Rob’s full of those; he’s a K grad. He’s also interested in the effect\u00a0(for good or ill) on our “showerdough” of different water treatment processes.<\/p>\n

Please forgive that “showerdough” malapropism; there’s a reason for it. Rob’s second current citizen-science project is all about the affect of microorganisms on sourdough and, ultimately on the taste of sourdough bread–across space and time. Some really interesting things may be going on there! Read Twilley’s article<\/a><\/strong> to find out. Citizen-science is nothing new to the Dunn lab. He’s done projects on belly button lint, human facial mites, insects in the kitchen, and household dust. Robs the author of three popular science books and was featured (“The Ant on Aldebaran”) in the Fall 2015 LuxEsto<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rob Dunn ’97 is at it again; it being another citizen-science project (or two). And it (or they) are the subject of a fun and wonderful piece by Nicola Twilley, “What’s Lurking in Your Showerhead,” that appears in the December 8 issue of the New Yorker magazine. Rob is an evolutionary biologist and professor at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":8241,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[232],"tags":[31,52,43,37,24],"post_formats":[],"class_list":["post-8239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","tag-alumni","tag-biology","tag-community","tag-research","tag-sciences"],"yoast_head":"\r\nShowerdough and Sourdough - News and Events<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Rob Dunn '97 is at it again; it being another citizen-science project (or two). 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And it (or they) are the subject of a fun and wonderful piece by Nicola\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"News and Events\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/KalamazooCollege\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-12-12T20:30:09+00:00\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-03-22T19:54:55+00:00\" \/>\r\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2016\/12\/rob_dunn-1.jpg\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"203\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"240\" \/>\r\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jim Van Sweden\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@kcollege\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@kcollege\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jim Van Sweden\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\r\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\",\"name\":\"Showerdough and Sourdough - News and Events\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2016\/12\/rob_dunn-1.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-12-12T20:30:09+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-03-22T19:54:55+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/33b812ef7fd17031ab566856049c97af\"},\"description\":\"Rob Dunn '97 is at it again; it being another citizen-science project (or two). 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aria-label=\"archive of category Alumni\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/category\/alumni\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Alumni<\/a>","tags_info":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/alumni\/\" rel=\"tag\">alumni<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/biology\/\" rel=\"tag\">biology<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/community\/\" rel=\"tag\">community<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/research\/\" rel=\"tag\">research<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/tag\/sciences\/\" rel=\"tag\">sciences<\/a>","social_share_info":"<a data-share=\"facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\" class=\"pl-facebook-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-facebook-f\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"twitter\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\" class=\"pl-twiiter-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-twitter\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a><a data-share=\"linkedin\" href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/shareArticle?url=https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/newyorkerdunn\/\" class=\"pl-linkedin-share social-share-default pl-social-share\" target=\"_blank\"><i class=\"fab fa-linkedin-in\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/i><\/a>","wordExcerpt_info":"<figure id=\"attachment_8240\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8240\" style=\"width: 203px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8240\" src=\"\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/files\/2016\/12\/rob_dunn.jpg\" alt=\"Rob Dunn '97 \" width=\"203\" height=\"240\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-8240\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rob Dunn ’97<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Rob Dunn ’97<\/strong> is at it again; it being another citizen-science project (or two). And it (or they) are the subject of a fun and wonderful piece by Nicola Twilley, “What’s Lurking in Your Showerhead,” that appears in the December 8 issue of the <em>New Yorker<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n<p>Rob is an evolutionary biologist and professor at North Carolina State University. Twilley is one of 500 participants in his lab’s Showerhead Microbiome Project. Those volunteers (in Europe and the United States) swab the gunk in their showerheads and send the samples Rob’s lab. Twilley found it a tad gross, but Rob wonders if it’s a good thing–those microorganisms in our showerheads. Turns out our bodies are full of other bodies–we depend on them. In fact, those other bodies’ cells (in or on us!) may outnumber our own, making me more other than myself. Wow! Whether or not what’s in our showerheads is good (or not so good) for us remains to be tested. First we have to see what’s in there in order to ask the right questions. Rob’s full of those; he’s a K grad. He’s also interested in the effect\u00a0(for good or ill) on our “showerdough” of different water treatment processes.<\/p>\n<p>Please forgive that “showerdough” malapropism; there’s a reason for it. Rob’s second current citizen-science project is all about the affect of microorganisms on sourdough and, ultimately on the taste of sourdough bread–across space and time. Some really interesting things may be going on there! Read Twilley’s <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/tech\/elements\/whats-lurking-in-your-showerhead\">article<\/a><\/strong> to find out. Citizen-science is nothing new to the Dunn lab. He’s done projects on belly button lint, human facial mites, insects in the kitchen, and household dust. Robs the author of three popular science books and was featured (“The Ant on Aldebaran”) in the Fall 2015 <em>LuxEsto<\/em>.<\/p>\n","comment_info":"No Comments","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8239"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11409,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8239\/revisions\/11409"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8239"},{"taxonomy":"post_format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kzoo.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_formats?post=8239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}