Walt Ream, Professor of Microbiology, Oregon State University, received the Richard M. Bressler Senior Faculty Teaching Award for developing the course this book supports. In addition to this work, he has written numerous peer reviewed scholarly papers, review articles, book articles and chapters and has co-authored another book entitled, Molecular Biology Techniques: An Intensive Laboratory Course. His research led to a discovery for which a patent was issued in 2004. He regularly reviews grant proposals for NSF, USDA, DOE, NIH, American Cancer Society, NSERC-Canada, Lindbergh Foundation, Corporation for Plant Biotechnology Research and he reviews papers for Journal of Bacteriology, Plant Molecular Biology, PNAS, Science, Molecular & General Genetics, Microbiological Reviews, Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions, Biochemistry, Journal of Biological Chemistry, Plasmid, Gene, Plant Physiology, Journal of American Horticulture Society, and Molecular Microbiology. He is a member of Genetics Society of America, American Society for Microbiology, and American Association for the Advancement of Science.