Kitchen sponges are festering germ dens–and sanitizing them doesn’t help

&gt; “Presumably, resistant bacteria survive the sanitation process and rapidly re–colonize the released niches until reaching a similar abundance as before the treatment,” the authors concluded.<p>So we could sterilise sponges then deliberately re-colonise with &#x27;good&#x27; bacteria to fill the niches. Maybe rinse with a bit of live culture yoghurt perhaps? Any bacteriologists on HN that could weigh in?

&gt;The researchers noted that a few of the sponge owners had said that they cleaned them regularly, either by microwaving or using hot-soapy washes. Those sponges didn’t have fewer microbes than the others, but they did tend to have more bacteria related to those that are linked to disease.<p>Microwaving or &quot;hot soapy washes&quot; sound ineffective to me. I boil my sponges, which seems to work; it certainly kills the smell.