Escherichia coli or E. coli for short. The name strikes fear in the heart of every parent, doctor and meat shop owner. But those days may be over soon, as a United States Department of Agriculture-affiliated lab in Nebraska is doubling its efforts to try and understand everything about the bug.

That includes how it gets into food, and how wreaks destruction on the digestive system on humans.But before we get into how they're going to do that, a brief backgrounder on what the deadly disease has been up to.

Last year, more than 30 million pounds of ground beef were pulled off the market in 20 recalls - all because of a suspected E. coli contamination. This resulted in the second-largest recall in U.S. history, forcing Topps Meat Co., a major meat company, to close its doors permanently.

2007 also saw E. coli contamination numbers rising, with 67 reported sicknesses linked to the disease. Thankfully, there were no deaths reported, but compared to 2006's numbers, where there were only eight beef recalls and no reported illnesses, it's definitely something to be alarmed about.