Today we want to share with you a TED video where the scientist Bonnie Bassler explains How bacteria can “talk”. She studies how bacteria can communicate with one another, through chemical signals, to act as a unit. This video is from 2009, and yet then her work was seen as crucial in the development of more potent medicine.

During this 20-minute speech, Bonnie Bassler’s shows her discoveries about the possibilities of communication between bacteria, using a chemical language that lets them coordinate defense and mount attacks. Bonnie Bassler is sometimes surprising as she gives statements such as “You think of yourselves as human beings, but I think of you as 99 percent bacterial.” We truly recommend you to see this talk:

 

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