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The upgrade to the site is finished. I will be adding new features now that I have moved to the latest software.

Writing a textbook is never an individual effort, and I would like to take a moment to thank all the people who helped along the way. Through the Microscope took 3 years to put together and many people gave valuable input and made the way easier in many ways.

To the Bacteriology Department. Thank you for providing the opportunity and creating an environment where teaching and learning really matter. It is an honor to work with such gifted and talented people. Specifically thanks to Robin, Jon, Diana, Jorge, Jo, Sarah and Judy. I have learned much about learning, teaching and life from each of you. And a special thank you to my co-author, Gary Roberts. As if you didn't have enough to do, you joined me in this quixotic adventure. Your contributions to the book have made it infinitely better than what I could have created by myself.

To my mother. Though you have been gone for almost 20 years, your love and lessons stay with me. You taught me to work hard and instilled in me a passionate curiosity about the world. Your example and love still sustain me. To my father. You have always been someone I have looked up to for the way you move though life, always overcoming the obstacles in front of you with a positive outlook. I doubt there is any challenge that could be placed in front of you that you could not meet. I will always remember your smile and the light in your eyes.

To my children. For those times when dad was working on the book and you needed something, I don't regret stopping to help. For the laughter, the sledding, the trips and for just hanging out. I thank you. Your presence and sense of fun make life worth living.

Finally, to my wife. Thank you for your patience, as I spent many nights at the computer, instead of with you. For your sage advice when I came up against a difficult problem. For your encouragement when I feared I would never get it done. And for your love, that makes everything I do worth while.

It's been an adventure, but I like this game.

Welcome

Welcome to the new and improved microbiology textbook, Through the microscope: a look at all things small. You may have arrived here by clicking on a link at the Bacteriology Department website located at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The effort of that textbook has now moved here and been expanded. This is now a complete textbook, including chapters on structure, metabolism, disease, the immune system, environmental microbiology and applied microbiology (See the table of contents below). Through the microscope's content coverage is complete and can serve as the textbook for an introductory microbiology course for majors or advanced non-majors. The book also endeavors to make the information engaging and dare I say it, fun to read. We hope you enjoy this text.

Through the microscope grew from a sense of excitement, interest and frustration. What a weird combination! The excitement and interest are for microbiology, a very important science if I do say so. The frustration stems from the trends I have seen in the book publishing industry. Frankly dear student, you are being taken advantage of. Textbook prices are too high. We find it appalling that a good textbook (and sometimes even a bad one) now costs $150! Textbook prices have risen at four times the rate of inflation. We wanted to do something about this besides convene another faculty committee. A second frustration was the realization that most publishers are too tied to the physical book and this weighs down their thinking, causing them to not use all the amazing tools available in an electronic book.

After being dumb enough to think I could actually pull this book off, I began a long journey of 3 years to bring it to fruition. We originally began this journey with what I thought was a new up and coming electronic publisher. However, after several adventures with this company and several others, I realized that these organizations spend more time buying each other out and reshuffling their organizational charts than actually working on textbooks. The people who actually do the work are nice and often competent, but because of all the uproar in the publishing industry, they are overworked and stressed out. It is a wonder that any textbook gets published. The remedy that many publishers are coming up with is to shove as much of the work of book publishing off onto the authors. We were expected to write the book, design the figures, chase down all copyrights for any images that I wanted to use, do our own marketing and create all sorts of value added content. Our last publisher, a major player in the textbook industry, was going to do us the great favor of hosting it on their web site and maybe do a little editing and that was it. Eventually, after several disappointing conversations, and delays of over a year (caused by them), I started to wonder why they should get 90% of the royalties? In October of 2006 I asked to be released from my contract. We have been able to finish the book in 4 months time, ahead of our planned schedule. One unexpected bonus is that I finally have total freedom to do what I want - many times I was restricted by somewhat arbitrary decisions made by the publisher to remove chapters or demands to follow certain formats.

You will find that this is not a conventional textbook. Nor is it a hard-cover textbook that I moved to the web. Both have been done before. This textbook was designed from the beginning to live on the web. Instead of having only text and images to convey the excitement of microbiology, Through the microscope contains movies, animations, interactive quizzes, searchable text, a pop-up glossary, and of course hyperlinks. We also have a forum where students can post questions that will be answered by the actual book authors. This allows students to experience microbiology in a more concrete and dynamic way. For example, when talking about motility, a movie shows motile and non-motile microbes. When describing respiration and the proton motive force, students are shown the reactions and enzymes involved in moving protons across a membrane. Finally, this is a living document. We are constantly making updates to the textbook -- a correction or a new piece of data can be added at any time. While the student may not appreciate this, it is a boon to authors.

Let me also caution that I do not have the weight of a publisher behind me. This means that some of the figures are not pretty and some of the text could be more polished. However, Gary and I have done our best to make this book as clear and understandable as possible. Please realize that it will not be as slick as a textbook from a major publisher. The old adage, you get what you pay for does apply. We just wanted to make sure you are going into this with your eyes wide open.

We hope you find this book useful in your studies.

A major editing and revision to the textbook has just been completed. New information and plenty of rewrites will hopefully make the book even more useful.

This site is a completely updated and expanded version of the previous microbiology textbook located at the Department of Bacteriology. Features of the new textbook include....

• Expanded content: A full 25 chapters is available covering many aspects of microbiology. A detailed table of contents listing every article in the book is available.
• New tools: Users can use the virtual highlighter to emphasize important passages in the book they want to remember using the Toggle Highlight function available in the tools menu.
• Full search: The book is fully searchable.
• Quick quizzes: Quizzes are available after every few sections to allow the reader to test their comprehension and expand their thinking about important subjects
• Complete figures: All figures have been completed for the book, including still graphics, table, animations, and videos

If you are interested, try out the sample chapters by logging in as test user. Username:TestUser, password: tryitout. You can then explore two chapters, Bacterial Structure and Animal defenses against microbes. If you want access to all the content, pay the low subscription fee of $30 to access the entire textbook.