STARS DIVIDER | Neon Rainbow.

‘Fragile Microbiomes’ by bio-artist Anna Dumitriu

1. SYPHILIS DRESS- This dress is embroidered with images of the corkscrew-shaped bacterium which causes the sexually transmitted disease syphilis. These embroideries are impregnated with the sterilised DNA of the Nichols strain of the bacterium - Treponema pallidum subsp. pallidum - which Dumitriu extracted with her collaborators.

2. MICROBE MOUTH- The tooth at the centre of this necklace was grown in the lab using an extremophile bacterium which is part of the species called Serratia (Serratia N14) that can produce hydroxyapatite, the same substance that tooth enamel is made from.

The handmade porcelain teeth that make up this necklace have been coated with glazes derived from various bacterial species that live in our mouths and cause tooth decay and gum disease, including Porphyromonas gingivalis, which can introduce an iron-containing light brown stain to the glaze.

3. TEETH MARKS: THE MOST PROFOUND MYSTERY- In his 1845 essay “On Artificial Teeth”, W.H. Mortimer described false teeth as “the most profound mystery” because they were never discussed. Instead, people would hide the stigma of bad teeth and foul breath using fans.

This altered antique fan is made from animal bone and has been mended with gold wire, both materials historically used to construct false teeth (which would also sometimes incorporate human teeth). The silk of the fan and ribbon has been grown and patterned with two species of oral pathogens: Prevotella intermedia and Porphyromonas gingivalis. These bacteria cause gum disease and bad breath, and the latter has also recently been linked to Alzheimer’s disease.

4. PLAGUE DRESS- This 1665-style 'Plague Dress' is made from raw silk, hand-dyed with walnut husks in reference to the famous herbalist of the era Nicholas Culpeper, who recommended walnuts as a treatment for plague. It has been appliquéd with original 17th-century embroideries, impregnated with the DNA of Yersinia pestis bacteria (plague). The artist extracted this from killed bacteria in the laboratory of the National Collection of Type Cultures at the UK Health Security Agency.

The dress is stuffed and surrounded by lavender, which people carried during the Great Plague of London to cover the stench of infection and to prevent the disease, which was believed to be caused by 'bad air' or 'miasmas'. The silk of the dress references the Silk Road, a key vector for the spread of plague.

5. BACTERIAL BAPTISM- based on a vintage christening gown which has been altered by the artist to tell the story of research into how the microbiomes of babies develop, with a focus on the bacterium Clostridioides difficile, originally discovered by Hall and O’Toole in 1935 and presented in their paper “Intestinal flora in new-born infants”. It was named Bacillus difficilis because it was difficult to grow, and in the 1970s it was recognised as causing conditions from mild antibiotic-associated diarrhoea to life-threatening intestinal inflammation. The embroidery silk is dyed using stains used in the study of the gut microbiome and the gown is decorated with hand-crocheted linen lace grown in lab with (sterilised) C. difficile biofilms. The piece also considers how new-borns become colonised by bacteria during birth in what has been described as ‘bacterial baptism’.

6. ZENEXTON- Around 1570, Swiss physician and alchemist Theophrastus Paracelsus coined the term ‘Zenexton’, meaning an amulet worn around the neck to protect from the plague. Until then, amulets had a more general purpose of warding off (unspecified) disease, rather like the difference today between ‘broad spectrum’ antibiotics and antibiotics informed by genomics approaches which target a specific organism.

Over the next century, several ideas were put forward as to what this amulet might contain: a paste made of powdered toads, sapphires that would turn black when they leeched the pestilence from the body, or menstrual blood. Bizarre improvements were later made: “of course, the toad should be finely powdered”; “the menstrual blood from a virgin”; “collected on a full moon”.

This very modern Zenexton has been 3D printed and offers the wearer something that genuinely protects: the recently developed vaccine against Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague.

⭐️The Beatles- Boys⭐️

"I've been told when a boy kiss a girl take a trip around the world"💕

They are absolutely fantastic and oh, my lovely Ringo!!😍😍😍💙

Hiiiii, I just stumbled upon your blog and omg I love your dividers so much, they're so aesthetic!! ♡ and I saw your requests are open, so I'd like to ask for these pretty babes originally from you as well, only now in a muted tan/cream and white colours! ♡ I'm so sorry if I ask too much, and thank you if you decide to take your time with them, 🥰 hope you're having a lovely, lovely day! ☀️🫶✨

howdy! and thank you so much! i’m so glad you like them ♥️

so i had to go back and re-make all of these so they may not be the exact same size as my originals, but they are pretty close! also i had to use more of the beige/tan tones because a lot of cream tones won’t show up well when i’m making them (or in light mode in general lol). so i hope you like these too!

please like and credit if you use, reblogs are appreciated! thank you! 💕

theyre dating your honour ...

Starrison 1963.

— valentine’s day dividers (candy heart edition)

[Free] Masterlist Headers & Dividers!

Please consider liking or reblogging if you use 💕

Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr in 1964 & 2024 🤍

David Lynch: The Art Life, 2016

It's very inconvenient but... I'm leaving the Ethel Cain fandom. And here's why.

As an adult, she drew CSAM with, as it seems to me, derogatory overtones like "The priests like to keep him chained up". WHAT. THE. FUCK? And it's not even chibi-like character. And if you say that "in that time everyone drew it", you know, it doesn't matter, because it was actually her choice to draw, not some kind of peer pressure or something like that.

It's disgusting. And there is no excuse for that. Even after I found out about the meaning of the song Punish, I already had some doubts.

And you can say, "It's Ethel. She's so hardcore horrorcore" and so on. Or "she was traumatized!". What happened to you in the past shouldn't justify things that you do in future.

And the saddest thing is that I like her music (especially Preacher's Daughter album). But her actions, even in the past, but at a conscious age, pushes me away from her and makes me no longer support her