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Provided/Esther Angert A close-up of the tip of an Epulopiscium with the tip of a protozoan (Paramecium) and the black spots are E. coli cells. The researcher mixed E. coli and Paramecium cells in with Epulopiscium she had picked out of fish gut contents to show the relative sizes. Provided/Esther Angert Three large Epulopiscium cells, each with several big internal offspring. This image shows total fish gut contents with some small eukaryotic flagellates and partially digested algae around the large Epulopiscium cells. Well, perhaps not quite Shaquille O'Neal. But it is Shaq-teria.The secret to an unusual bacterium's massive size...

Bacteria Levels In Aircraft Shows Low Risk To Travelers, Study Shows ScienceDaily (May 2, 2008) — Popular wisdom says that aircraft provide the perfect environment for spreading disease, but few studies exist to confirm or deny this suspicion. Now, a team of researchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, a leading federal agency and Harvard University has measured concentrations of bacteria in the cabin air of 12 commercial passenger aircraft, and found that flying may be safer than we think. “In general, bacterial concentrations and types found during the study should not pose a risk to travelers,” says Christine Rogers,...

Enlarge ImageScience of sleep. The scientists used fluorescent proteins--green and red in these images--to determine whether E. coli bacteria were active.Credit: Gefen et al., PNAS 105 (22 April 2008) Most antibiotics kill only microbes that are growing and multiplying, leaving untouched a select few that are hibernating. A new study suggests that a dose of the right nutrients can awaken these bacteria for just long enough to kill them with antibiotics. If the strategy works in humans, it might provide a more effective way to treat persistent diseases such as tuberculosis and urinary-tract infections. During infections, bacteria may slow...

Dr. Mom Was Right -- And Wrong -- About Washing Fruits And VegetablesA new study shows that irradiation could be key to removing hard-to-reach pathogens inside fruits and vegetables. (Credit: Courtesy of USDA-Agricultural Research Service, photo by Stephen Ausmus) ScienceDaily (Apr. 13, 2008) — Washing fresh fruits and vegetables before eating may reduce the risk of food poisoning and those awful episodes of vomiting and diarrhea. But according to new research, described recently at the 235th national meeting of the American Chemical Society, washing alone -- even with chlorine disinfectants -- may not be enough. Studies show that certain disease-causing...

Lingering Bacteria Don't Indicate Chronic Lyme Disease ScienceDaily (Apr. 3, 2008) — The bacteria that cause Lyme disease, the most common tick-borne illness in the United States, can linger in mouse tissues long after a full round of antibiotic treatment is completed, report researchers from the University of California, Davis. The scientists caution that the discovery does not suggest the presence of chronic disease, nor does it support extended use of antibiotics to treat Lyme disease in humans. Their findings are reported in the March issue of the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. However, they say, the results of this...

AP Medical Writer Antibiotics for breakfast? The drugs are supposed to kill bacteria, not feed them. Yet Harvard researchers have discovered hundreds of germs in soil that literally gobble up antibiotics, able to thrive with the potent drugs as their sole source of nutrition. These bacteria outwit antibiotics in a disturbingly novel way, and now the race is on to figure out just how they do it - in case more dangerous germs that sicken people could develop the same ability. On the other hand, the work explains why the soil doesn't harbor big antibiotic buildups despite use of the...

The number of suspected salmonella cases linked to contaminated tap water in Alamosa, Colorado exceeded 200 Sunday. Of 216 reported cases, 68 were confirmed by lab results, public information officer Jim Shires said. health officials said may be caused by the municipal water system. Health officials said the Alamosa tap water tested positive for bacteria believed to be salmonella, but are awaiting final confirmation. Authorities said the first victim began showing symptoms around March 8. State emergency management officials activated an emergency operations center in the Denver suburb of Centennial to help coordinate deliveries of bottled water. “The risk that...

Hardy Earth bacteria can grow in lunar soil 00:53 14 March 2008 NewScientist.com news service David Shiga, Houston A hardy life form called cyanobacteria can grow in otherwise inhospitable lunar soil, new experiments suggest. Future colonists on the Moon might be able to use the cyanobacteria to extract resources from the soil that could be used to make rocket fuel and fertiliser for crops. NASA plans to send astronauts back to the Moon starting in 2020, with the ultimate aim of setting up a permanent lunar base. Sustaining such a base will be a major challenge, because it is so...

The same bacteria that cause frost damage on plants can help clouds to produce rain and snow. Studies on freshly fallen snow suggest that ‘bio-precipitation’ might be much more common than was suspected. Before a cloud can produce rain or snow, rain drops or ice particles must form. This requires the presence of aerosols: tiny particles that serve as the nuclei for condensation. Most such particles are of mineral origin, but airborne microbes — bacteria, fungi or tiny algae — can do the job just as well. Unlike mineral aerosols, living organisms can catalyse ice formation even at temperatures close...

Gainesville -- Officials at Mar-Jac Poultry said they were shocked to find out Thursday that federal officials suspect the company might have ties to terrorist funding. Company Vice President Doug Carnes said at least a half-dozen U.S. Customs agents spent all day Wednesday gathering financial records and charitable contribution files. They were "real nice, professional and complimentary," he said, but they didn't disclose the nature of their visit. It was only on Thursday that Carnes was alerted by company officials in Virginia as to what the agents were looking for. "I'm shocked. I'm in disbelief. I've worked for them for...

Natural Gas Formation By Bacteria Linked To Climate Change And Renewable Energy ScienceDaily (Jan. 28, 2008) — Natural gas reservoirs in Michigan’s Antrim Shale are providing new information about global warming and the Earth’s climate history, according to a recent study by Steven Petsch, a geoscientist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. The study is also good news for energy companies hoping to make natural gas a renewable resource. Petsch found that carbon-hungry bacteria trapped deep in the rock beneath ice sheets produced the gas during the ice age, as glaciers advanced and retreated over Michigan. “Bacteria digested the carbon...

More Insights into Using Bacteria to Generate Electricity from Waste Tempe, Arizona [RenewableEnergyAccess.com] Researchers at the Biodesign Institute are using the tiniest organisms on the planet -- bacteria -- as a viable option to make electricity. In a new study featured in the journal Biotechnology and Bioengineering, lead author Andrew Kato Marcus and colleagues Cesar Torres and Bruce Rittmann have gained critical insights that may lead to commercialization of a promising microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology. "We can use any kind of waste, such as sewage or pig manure, and the microbial fuel cell will generate electrical energy," said Marcus,...

Unpicking the route by which microbes produce methane could help to boost the process. Getting usable fuel out of the heavy oil of Canada's tar fields takes a lot of energy.Ian M. Head Researchers have worked out how natural bacteria deep within the Earth break down crude oil and produce methane. This knowledge could help with projects to encourage these bacteria to covert more oil, faster. And it could point towards a way to produce hydrogen - an even cleaner fuel - by using these natural fuel-processing plants.Microbes living on the crude oil in petroleum reservoirs usually start by biodegrading...

It has always been believed, but never proven that French clay can kill several varieties of bacteria that cause diseases. Today, a researcher at Arizona State University at Tempe is leading a study to show why certain minerals kill certain bacteria. French clay has been shown to kill Mycobacterium ulcerans, or M. Ulcerans, which is so epidemical in Africa. It also treats Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which is responsible for deadly infections that are difficult to treat. Furthermore, it has been known for thousands of years that people have used clay for healing wounds, helping indigestion, and killing intestinal worms....

Californians’ easy access to raw milk—it’s available in 350 health food stores and 40 Whole Foods grocery stores around the state—has been placed in serious jeopardy by a few words about a bacteria standard included in Assembly Bill 1735, a piece of agriculture legislation signed into law a couple weeks ago by Gov. Arnold Schwarzeneger, and due to take effect January 1. Also in jeopardy is the mini-empire built up by Mark McAfee, owner of Organic Pastures Dairy Co., the dairy that supplies about 95% of the state’s unpasteurized milk, consumed by more than 100,000 Californians each week. Mark has...

Everyone seems to think that ethanol is a good way to make cars greener. Everyone is wrong SOMETIMES you do things simply because you know how to. People have known how to make ethanol since the dawn of civilisation, if not before. Take some sugary liquid. Add yeast. Wait. They have also known for a thousand years how to get that ethanol out of the formerly sugary liquid and into a more or less pure form. You heat it up, catch the vapour that emanates, and cool that vapour down until it liquefies. The result burns. And when Henry Ford...

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Some of the nastiest bacteria that thrive in the human gut and make us sick may have evolved from hardy ancestors living deep under the sea, a group of Japanese scientists found.

WASHINGTON – In the wake of scandals involving tainted food and toothpaste from China comes word of a new concern from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission as well as the Food and Drug Administration – toys, makeup, glazed pottery and other products that contain significant amounts of lead. While lead poisoning among children was once mainly caused by old paint, U.S. manufacturers long ago banned the ingredient. Today, a new rash of high lead levels in the bloodstreams of American kids is being caused by foreign products – mainly from China. So serious is the resurgence of lead poisoning...

Researchers in Germany reported Thursday that they had altered the DNA of a disease-causing bacterium so that it can infect a species it cannot normally sicken. Experts called the development a double-edged advance. Although the research could deepen scientists' understanding of human diseases, it also could speed development of novel bioterror agents. The change in infectiousness - the first of its kind ever engineered from scratch - poses no direct threat to human health, scientists said, because the microbe already causes a human disease - the food-borne illness called listeriosis. The change allows that microbe to sicken mice, a species...

A man diagnosed with a rare strain of tuberculosis will be flown to Denver for treatment at the National Jewish Medical and Research Center. This morning, officials at Denver’s National Jewish Medical and Research Center weren’t sure when the now world-famous TB patient would arrive for treatment. "I think they’re still figuring out how he’s going to get here," said hospital spokesman William Allstetter. The unidentified patient was transferred from New York to Atlanta on a CDC airplane. Allstetter stressed that National Jewish, which is world renown for treatment of respiratory and immune disorders, is well-prepared to handle the case....

While Americans are recovering from a scandal over poison pet foods imported from China, FDA inspectors report tainted food imports intended for American humans are being rejected with increasing frequency, as they are filthy, are contaminated with pesticides and tainted with carcinogens, bacteria and banned drugs.

BACTERIA cause disease. The idea that they might also prevent disease is counterintuitive. Yet that is the hypothesis Chris Lowry, of Bristol University, and his colleagues are putting forward in Neuroscience. They think a particular sort of bacterium might alleviate clinical depression. The chance observation that Dr Lowry followed up to arrive at this conclusion was made by Mary O'Brien, an oncologist at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London. Dr O'Brien was trying out an experimental treatment for lung cancer that involved inoculating patients with Mycobacterium vaccae. This is a harmless relative of the bugs that cause tuberculosis and leprosy...

A human body is not the individual organism its proud owner may suppose but rather a walking zoo of microbes and parasites, each exploiting a special ecological niche in its comfortable, temperature-controlled conveyance. Some of these fellow travelers live so intimately with their hosts, biologists are finding, that they accompany them not just in space but also in time, passing from generation to generation for thousands of years. The latest organism to be identified as a longtime member of the human biota club is Streptococcus mutans, the bacterium that causes tooth decay. From samples collected around the world, Dr. Page...

Hundreds die from deadly bacteria JERUSALEM, March 7 (UPI) -- Doctors said an antibiotic-resistant bacterium known as Klebsiella pneumoniae has killed as many as 200 patients in hospitals across Israel. Elderly patients and people with weak immune systems are particularly vulnerable to the bacterium, Arutz Sheva reported. Epidemiologist Yehuda Carmeli of the Sourasky Medical Center in Tel Aviv said 400 to 500 people have been infected by the bug. "Thirty to forty percent of them have already died," Carmeli told YNetNews. "However, it is important to note that most of them were in a serious condition, and some were suffering...

Scientists successfully store "e=mc2 1905" on DNA of living matterFebruary 27, 2007 (Computerworld) -- A Japanese university announced scientists there have developed a new technology that uses bacteria DNA as a medium for storing data long-term, even for thousands of years. Keio University Institute for Advanced Biosciences and Keio University Shonan Fujisawa Campus announced the development of the new technology, which creates an artificial DNA that carries up to more than 100 bits of data within the genome sequence, according to the JCN Newswire. The universities said they successfully encoded "e= mc2 1905!" -- Einstein's theory of relativity and the...

Source: University of Queensland Date: February 17, 2007 Bacterial Gene May Affect Climate And Weather Science Daily — A University of Queensland microbiologist is part of an international team that has identified a bacterial gene that may affect climate and weather. Dr Phil Bond, from UQ's Advanced Wastewater Management Centre, and his former colleagues at the University of East Anglia in England, have found how a particular type of marine bacteria – Marinomonas – generates a compound that is a key component in global sulfur and carbon cycles. “Marine algae can produce large amounts of a compound (dimethylsulfoniopropionate or DMSP)...

A germ that kills males triggers a vicious cycle of increasing female promiscuity and male sexual exhaustion in a species of butterfly, scientists report. Male-killing bacteria known as Wolbachia are extremely widespread in insects, found in more than one-fifth of species. The germs can turn males to females and cause infected females to reproduce without males. Scientists had assumed these bacteria would profoundly alter the natural mating patterns of their hosts, but only had scant evidence of what these changes would entail in the wild.

Yaws makes a comeback 10:45 03 February 2007 From New Scientist Print Edition. You've probably never heard of it, but yaws - a crippling disease that largely disappeared with the arrival of antibiotics - is making a comeback. Spread by casual contact, the chronic skin condition is caused by a bacterium similar to that behind syphilis. It begins as pustules and progresses to gross bone deformities. It can be cured with a long-acting penicillin shot. Between 1950 and 1970, a World Health Organization-led programme treated 50 million people in 46 countries, cutting yaws cases by 95 per cent. However, in...

Source: Society of Chemical Industry Date: January 29, 2007 New Approach Could Lower Antibiotic Requirements By 50 Times Science Daily — Antibiotic doses could be reduced by up to 50 times using a new approach based on bacteriophages. Steven Hagens, previously at the University of Vienna, told Chemistry & Industry, the magazine of the SCI, that certain bacteriophages, a type of virus that infects bacteria, can boost the effectiveness of antibiotics gentamicin, gramacidin or tetracycline. It is the phages' ability to channel through bacterial cell membranes that boosts antibiotic effectiveness. 'Pseudomonas bacteria for example are particularly multi-resistant to antibiotics because...

Source: Texas A&M Health Science Center Date: January 28, 2007 Bacteria In Staph Infections Can Cause Necrotizing Pneumonia Science Daily — Researchers at the Texas A&M Health Science Center Institute of Biosciences and Technology at Houston have discovered a toxin present in the bacteria responsible for the current nationwide outbreak of staph infections also has a role in an aggressive pneumonia that is often fatal within 72 hours. "The virulence of CA-MRSA (community-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) strains that produce the PVL (Panton Valentine leukocidin) toxin presents a nightmare scenario," said M. Gabriela Bowden, Ph.D., research assistant professor at HSC-IBT and...

Source: University of Florida Date: January 22, 2007 Microwave Oven Can Sterilize Sponges, Scrub Pads Science Daily — Microwave ovens may be good for more than just zapping the leftovers; they may also help protect your family. University of Florida engineering researchers have found that microwaving kitchen sponges and plastic scrubbers — known to be common carriers of the bacteria and viruses that cause food-borne illnesses – sterilizes them rapidly and effectively. That means that the estimated 90-plus percent of Americans with microwaves in their kitchens have a powerful weapon against E. coli, salmonella and other bugs at the root...

The history of medicine is a rich and fascinating topic which has very little relevance to non-geeks... until now! Researchers from the Mayo Clinic have published a paper in the BMJ, which used an ancient herbal text as a guide to finding novel drugs. Apparently they stumbled onto an antibiotic that can wipe out some of the more stubborn strains of super bacterias. Here's more from the press release: A unique Mayo Clinic collaboration has revived the healing wisdom of Pacific Island cultures by testing a therapeutic plant extract described in a 17th century Dutch herbal text for its anti-bacterial...

People in the United States have gotten used to the repulsive fact that raw chicken, meat and eggs are often contaminated with dangerous bacteria. Scrub the cutting board, we are warned, don’t nibble the cookie dough, don’t eat burgers rare. In other words, handle meat like a biohazard — and then eat it. But until recently, getting sick from salad was something that most Americans didn’t even think about unless they were traveling to a poor country. At home, fruits and vegetables have been regarded as clean and safe for as long as most people can remember. Lately, though, produce...

Many people worry about putting on a few pounds during the holiday season. But when you reach for a Christmas cookie, keep in mind that you're not the only one who's going to enjoy that tasty treat: It will also get eaten by the bacteria living in your gut. And it turns out that the kind of bacteria living there may affect how much weight you gain. Until a couple of years ago, scientists didn't have the tools to figure out exactly what lives in a person's digestive tract. But with new genetic probes, they can do a kind of...

  SOUTH PLAINFIELD, N.J. (AP) - Taco Bell ordered scallions removed from its 5,800 U.S. restaurants Wednesday after tests suggested they may be responsible for the E. coli outbreak that has sickened at least three dozen people in three states. The fast-food chain said preliminary testing by an independent lab found three samples of green onions appeared to have a dangerous strain of the bacterium. "In an abundance of caution, we've decided to pull all green onions from our restaurants until we know conclusively whether they are the cause of the E. coli outbreak," said Greg Creed, president of Irvine,...

A French sailor sneezes as colleagues look on in a file photo. Many people carry a potential disease-causing microbe in their nose and new research shows that large amounts of this organism and other bacteria are released into the air with every sneeze. (File/Reuters) Many people carry Staphylococcus aureus, a potential disease-causing microbe, in their nose and now new research shows that large amounts of this organism and other bacteria are released into the air with every sneeze. While the presence of the common cold does not affect this dispersion, allergies seem to increase it. "Our findings suggest that...

The evolutionary advantage that magnetic bacteria enjoy has always been something of a conundrum, but now, scientists at the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) and Purdue University have shed at least some light on the mystery. Their description of how being magnetic assists the bacteria to navigate appears in the Biophysical Journal. Found in a variety of aquatic environments, magnetic bacteria grow strings of microscopic magnetic particles called magnetosomes. When placed in a magnetic field, these make the bacteria align like tiny compass needles, a phenomenon call magnetotaxis. The strain of bacterium the NRL team studied, Magnetospirillum magneticum, was originally found...

Popeye the Sailor Man would have approved of the green, leafy spinach gobbled up by Sadex Corp. officials early Wednesday morning. Popeye definitely would not have approved of the spinach if he could have seen it under a microscope before it underwent irradiation -- the spinach contained 5 million colonies of E.coli bacteria per gram. "You would have been better off to have a cow come and dump on it," said David Corbin, chairman and chief executive officer of the Sadex Corp. Officials at the Sadex Corp. irradiated the highly contaminated spinach at the Sioux City plant, 2650 Murray St....

· Technique renders pathogens benign· Crop and animal diseases could also be targeted Scientists have taken a big step towards a new generation of antibiotics by designing compounds that stop bacteria "talking to each other", thwarting their ability to spread infection. The revolutionary approach renders bacteria benign rather than killing them off, and comes as many antibiotics are losing their potency against pathogens which have developed drug resistance.Tests showed the compounds actively blocked the spread of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a common bacterium which causes fatal lung infections in people with cystic fibrosis and leads to life-threatening blood infections in patients with...

PROBIOTIC bacteria given to autistic children improved their concentration and behaviour so much that medical trials collapsed because parents refused to accept placebos, a scientist revealed yesterday. The effect of the bacteria was so pronounced that some of the parents taking part in what was supposed to be a blind trial realised their children were taking something other than a placebo. A number then refused to give their children the placebo when they were due to switch, resulting in the collapse of the trial. Glenn Gibson, a microbiologist who ran the study of 40 autistic children aged between four and...

In April 2005, Sara Stephan, a 13-year old in Charleroi, Pa., developed what looked like a pimple on her cheek. A blemish on a teenager is not exactly cause for alarm, but her mother, Carla Stephan, became concerned when it started to spread and swell. “Her whole cheek got big and red,” she said. Next, a similar lesion above Sara’s eye. Then, she got one the size of a softball on her buttock, and several more on her thighs. Tests showed that Sara had a particularly persistent and sometimes deadly bacterial infection known as methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, often abbreviated as...

It begins as microscopic bacteria that invades the intestine with the potential to kill in extreme cases, or cause severe bouts of diarrhea in other instances. Probably a hundred cases have occurred in the past year in the Antelope Valley, though most of those stricken with Clostridium difficile survived, according to Dr. Michael Cohen, an infectious diseases specialist in Lancaster who tends to patients at Antelope Valley and Lancaster Community hospitals. "We've had cases at both hospitals," Cohen said. "Cases have been documented nationwide. At least three patients in Antelope Valley died." Deaths usually result from one of two conditions:...

(KUTV) SALT LAKE CITY Its' something just about every woman carries with them. While we may know what's inside our purses, do you have any idea what's on the outside? Shauna Lake put purses to the test – for bacteria – with surprising results. You may think twice about where you put your purse. Women carry purses everywhere from the office to public restrooms to the floor of the car. Most women won't be caught without their purses, but did you ever stop to think about where your purse goes during the day? “I drive a school bus, so my...

The discovery that a wide variety of bacteria can be persuaded to produce wire-like appendages that conduct electricity could prove vital to the development of more efficient biological fuel cells. Bacteria that use sugars and sewage as fuel are being investigated as a pollution-free source of electricity. They feed by plucking electrons from atoms in their fuel and dumping them onto the oxygen or metal atoms in the mixture. The transfer of the electrons creates a current, and connecting the bacteria to an electrode in a microbial fuel cell will generate electricity, although not necessarily very efficiently. A species of...

ST. LOUIS - The microorganisms that live in your gut could explain one of the sources of obesity, says a new study from researchers at Washington University. Bacteria live throughout the body, but some intestinal bacteria appear to be better than others at helping their hosts turn food into energy, say researchers Buck S. Samuel and Dr. Jeffrey I. Gordon. They believe changing the mix of bacteria in the intestine could influence how much people weigh. Bacteria and archaea, another kind of single-celled organism, are common in the human intestine. Researchers are discovering that together, they help their human hosts...

Dust clouds transport bacteria from Africa around the world Ian Sample Thursday May 25, 2006 Giant clouds of dust whipped up by desert storms in Africa can carry infectious organisms to other continents, scientists claim today. Despite being blown more than three miles high and exposed to radiation from the sun, strains of bacteria and fungi survived and were able to grow when they returned to Earth, researchers found. Among 40 tests of air samples taken in the mid-Atlantic, 24 revealed living microbes, including 26 colonies of bacteria and 83 fungi. They included strains capable of causing disease in humans,...

Darwinian evolution follows very few of the available mutational pathways to attain fitter proteins, researchers at Harvard University have found in a study of a gene whose mutant form increases bacterial resistance to a widely prescribed antibiotic by a factor of roughly 100,000. Their work indicates that of 120 harrowing, five-step mutational paths that theoretically could grant antibiotic resistance, only about 10 actually endow bacteria with a meaningful evolutionary advantage. The research is described this week in the journal Science. "Just as there are many alternate routes one might follow in driving from Boston to New York, one intrinsic property...

ATLANTA, March 21 — Antibiotic resistance has long been an important human health problem. But now it is also showing up in a small but growing number of pets in this country, Canada and Europe, scientists and federal health officials said on Tuesday at the International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases here. The health officials said they did not want to sound too loud an alarm. But they said they wanted to learn more about the problem that has developed involving the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, the most common cause of staphylococcal infections among people. The same genetic strains of S....

Joe Carter at The Evangelical Outpost has an outstanding article on the "God of the Gaps." Joe explains in easily understandable terms that the notion "actually encompasses four different views based on distinctions between a “science gap� (a gap in our current scientific knowledge) and a “nature gap� (a break in the continuous cause-effect chain of natural process) that may or may not be bridged by miraculous-appearing theistic action." As technology advances, our science gaps close, but more science gaps often rise up to take their place. For example, we once thought that an electron was a sub-atomic particle that...

Bellingham Boy Fighting Flesh-Eating Bacteria SEATTLE, Wash. -- What started as a 'fat lip' from a fall, now has a local 6 year old Jake Finkbonner fighting to survive. The boy has necrotizing faciitis, a bacteria that is attacking his face. His family says the bacteria was consuming him before their eyes. The infection is so aggressive, antibiotics aren't enough. He’s had three surgeries so far to try to save his life. Jake’s father, Donny, (says)......all of us are praying for him, and we’re just in God’s hands.” Jake’s mother, Elsa says, “he didn’t have any facial features that were...