--- title: Five Best: How Probiotics Can Prevent Infections in Babies description: How probiotics could fight a deadly blood infection in babies, how cities are using chatbots to serve citizens and more. canonical: https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-08-23T16:00:43.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:58:33.443Z article:section: Ideas og:title: How Probiotics Could Protect Newborns From Deadly Infections og:description: And four more of today's best ideas og:url: https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How Probiotics Could Protect Newborns From Deadly Infections twitter:description: And four more of today's best ideas twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # How Probiotics Could Protect Newborns From Deadly Infections by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Aug 23, 2017 4:00 PM UTC by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Aug 23, 2017 4:00 PM UTC **1\.** [**Probiotic bacteria — that occur naturally in pickled vegetables — could protect newborns from deadly infection.**](http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/08/16/543920822/probiotic-bacteria-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infection) By Michaeleen Doucleff at NPR **2\.** [**Here’s how cities are using chatbots to deliver data and services to citizens.**](http://www.govtech.com/civic/Rise-of-the-Government-Chatbot.html) By Zack Quaintance in GovTech **3\.** [**There are lots of reasons to raise the minimum wage. Add reducing child neglect cases to the list.**](https://news.iu.edu/stories/2017/08/iub/releases/16-minimum-wage-and-child-neglect.html) By Indiana University **4\.** [**With foldable 3D-printed parts, ‘Robogami’ aims to make robot design accessible to all.**](https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/22/mits-robogami-lets-you-build-custom-3d-printable-robots-from-standard-folding-parts/) By Devin Coldewey at TechCrunch **5\.** [**We know how to teach writing well. Are we willing to do it?**](https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/we-know-how-teach-writing) By John Warner at Inside Higher Ed  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/) _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/"},"headline":"How Probiotics Could Protect Newborns From Deadly Infections","datePublished":"2017-08-23T16:00:43.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:58:33.443Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/","keywords":["Five Best Ideas","Innovation","probiotics","writing"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/five-best-ideas/","name":"Five Best Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4911836/how-probiotics-could-protect-newborns-from-deadly-infections/","name":"How Probiotics Could Protect Newborns From Deadly Infections"}}]}] ```