When I was still at school, a school trip usually involved a museum or some other such institution. However, a group of school children were recently asked to explore their neighborhood and find potentially beneficial bacteria. We would also often return with little souvenirs from our trip, but one little girl brought back something that turned out to be far more valuable – goose droppings. “But, how on Earth are goose droppings valuable?”, you might be wondering. Well, read on below to find out!
The Chicago Antibiotic Discovery Lab

It turns out that bacteria found in goose droppings have led scientists to find a compound that can potentially fight against cancer. This was discovered through the Chicago Antibiotic Discovery Lab, a new 14-week science program involving students and scientists from the University of Illinois at Chicago. The idea was to provide the students with hands-on experience in the field of science. The children were asked to look around the neighborhood and try and find various bioactive compounds. These compounds would then be studied by the research team in search of new antibiotics.
Finding the Goose Droppings

One of the students involved was Camarria Williams, a 13-year-old girl part of the Boys and Girls Club in Chicago. She found her sample of goose droppings in Chicago’s Garfield Park Lagoon. Her sample was then placed under a microscope for examination. According to Williams, her mother often fed the birds and she had seen that they eat absolutely anything. So, she assumed there must be some interesting bacteria present in the goose drooping. As it turns out, she was more correct than she or anyone else knew at the time.
The Science Program

The children are even involved in the laboratory work rather than just watching from the sidelines. They are taught how to operate a robot that scoops the bacteria from growth plates and then tests the colonies for antibiotics. The sample revealed that the bacteria found in the sample, Pseudomonas idahonensis, produces a natural compound that was previously unknown, named orfamide N. After interpreting the initial bioassay data, they determined that the bacterium displayed promising antibiotic activity.
Exciting Properties

However, it eventually turned out that the antibiotic effects initially observed were not due to orfamide N. Laboratory tests subsequently carried out showed that this bacterium actually possessed an exciting property that was just as exciting. Researchers discovered that small doses of orfamide N slowed down the growth of both ovarian cancer cells and melanoma. While these findings are preliminary, they do indicate possible therapeutic applications that definitely merit further exploration. Because Williams found the sample, she is listed as one of the paper’s co-authors – not bad for a 13-year-old student! The study was published in the ACS Omega journal in October 2024.
The Bottom Line

Initiatives such as those launched by The Chicago Antibiotic Discovery Lab prove just how important it is to educate students on scientific research from an early age. However, this education should extend beyond the theory and should include hands-on work that involves the children in the entire process. While the orfamide N found in the goose droppings did not have the effect they initially thought it would have, it turned out to have a different, yet equally important role in cancer research. Discovering something valuable while looking for something else is actually more common in the scientific field than you might expect! It is also often found in the strangest of unexpected places – like goose droppings.