Skip to primary content
Skip to secondary content

Monica Aissa Martinez

Artist living and working in Phoenix

Monica Aissa Martinez

Main menu

  • Home
  • About
  • Exhibition schedule
  • Press
  • Video
  • Coasters
  • Cats
    • ali
    • issa
  • Contact Me

Tag Archives: art meets science

aspergillus hyphae

Posted on November 25, 2020 by monica
2

Hyphae (plural) are the branching filaments that make up the structure of a fungus.


Friday, I have questions for scientist, Ana Alastruey-Izquierdo. Saturday, she has answers for me.

Sunday morning, out for a run, I wonder how to approach a second study of aspergillus. Looking around, I know the fungus is all around me. I come across a dead tree and have the idea to gather twigs for drawing texture and interesting mark-making.

Drawing implement or Aspergillus/Fugus carrier?

Though I don’t want to simplify Ana’s work, I do want to get a general sense of the bug.

Where in the body does aspergillus end up? (I think breathing pathways…nose, lungs. How about the liver?) How and what sort of damage does it cause? On a scale from 1-10  how bad/problematic to a person – is this fungus? (I hope she doesn’t cringe at the latter.)

It can go almost anywhere, Ana explains. We daily breath thousands of Aspergillus spores. It is in our lungs. People with a healthy inmune system usually clear it up and it does not go further. There are some persons in which an allergic response is developed and this causes allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis (ABPA).

The other important group are people that have problems with the immune system (cancer, transplants, HIV, people under corticosteroids, diabetic…etc). In these patients Aspergillus enters into the lungs and if it is not cleared by their immune system it further develops infections and can lead to invasive aspergilosis that if not treated has 100% mortality. Mainly Aspergillus causes respiratory infections but as I said, it can diseminate in people with impaired immune systems.

Ana continues… How bad/problematic for a person with Aspergillus depends on the immune system. Mortality is arround 40% but can reach 80% if we are dealing with strains that are resistant to antifungals. 

The problem with antifungal resistance is that it is not frequently screened. There aren’t many commercially available methods to test for it.  Often it is only performed in developed countries and sometimes restricted to reference or very specialized labs.

And regarding the rate from 1 to 10, if you are immunosuppressed or have an underlying disease it can be very problematic, like an 8 or 9. People that are at high risk for developing invasive fungal infections, like hematological patients, receive antifungal prophylaxis by default. But if you are healthy, no problem.

I work and consider her words and the value of this education.

textured substrate

work in progress

Aspergillus Hyphae, Mixed media on wood, 8″ round

Please feel free to leave questions and/or comments.

More about the work of → Ana Alastruey Izquierdo

#artistmeetsscientist #artmeetsscience #publicengagement


One of the best parts of this particular Public Engagement Project is that I connect with scientists in other parts of the world.

It’s a pleasure to meet you Ana, albeit virtually. Thank you for teaching me about this beautiful but potentially nasty fungus.

Mucho gusto en conocerte Ana!


©2020 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED BY MONICA AISSA MARTINEZ

Posted in art, education, process, science | Tagged ana alastruey-izquierdo, art, art meets science, artist meets scientist, aspergillus, education, fungus, hyphae, maria adelaida duque correa, process, public engagement, science | 2 Replies

copyright

©MONICA AISSA MARTINEZ, ARTIST LIVING AND WORKING IN PHOENIX, 2020
No part of this site, image or text, may be copied or reproduced without consent of the artist

Blog Stats

  • 171,612 hits

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 396 other followers

Artist Website

  • Artist Website

pages

  • About
  • Exhibition schedule
  • Press
  • Video
  • Coasters
  • Cats
    • ali
    • issa
  • Contact Me

Facebook

Facebook

calendar

January 2021
S M T W T F S
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
31  
« Dec    

dialogue

monica on trichuris trichiura
Maria Duque on trichuris trichiura
Sandra Reuter on yersinia pestis, insidious you…
monica on yersinia pestis, insidious you…
Sandra Reuter on yersinia pestis, insidious you…
kenhallettblog on under the microscope – u…
monica on under the microscope – u…
monica on under the microscope – u…
kenhallettblog on under the microscope – u…
Sandra Reuter on yersinia pestis, insidious you…
Maria Duque on under the microscope – u…
under the microscope… on i draw beautiful whipworms (no…
insidious yersinia p… on macrophage – large. eati…
monica on an anopheles mosquito and the…
Alejandro Marin Mene… on an anopheles mosquito and the…

recent posts

  • trichuris trichiura
  • under the microscope – unembryonated whipworm eggs
  • muscles coordinate (tree of life)
  • yersinia pestis, insidious you are
  • all things bacteria
  • plasmodium stages and cycles or is it cycles and stages
  • an anopheles mosquito and the unicellular organism it transfers
  • aspergillus hyphae
  • aspergillus / filamentous fungi
  • international steam day
  • a visually driven post
  • the appendix
  • ileum
  • rip rbg
  • see one do one teach one

categories

archives

Calendar

January 2021
S M T W T F S
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
31  
« Dec    

Category Cloud

anatomy art art exhibit artist spaces art materials beginnings brain charcoal collaborative art project creativity drawing education folk art learning mask making microbes music narrative Nothing In Stasis no woman is an island painting phoenix art exhibit photogrpahy portrait making process science STEAM teaching what goes on and what takes place yoga

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

cloud

anatomy art art exhibit artist spaces art materials beginnings brain charcoal collaborative art project creativity drawing education folk art learning mask making microbes music narrative Nothing In Stasis no woman is an island painting phoenix art exhibit photogrpahy portrait making process science STEAM teaching what goes on and what takes place yoga
Blog at WordPress.com.
Cancel