Volume 1 Issue 9, September 2016

The global effect of human activities on Earth's microbiota has not yet been considered. Here, we identify potential trajectories of microbial change, and highlight knowledge gaps that need to be addressed to better understand how microbial communities across the globe will change in the future.

Inspection of more than 286,000 gene families has shed light on the most recent common ancestors of all life. The last universal common ancestor was likely to have been a thermophilic, anaerobic, N₂-fixing organism that used the Wood–Ljungdahl pathway to fix CO₂, using H₂ as an electron donor.

Patients with atopic dermatitis have fundamentally different skin microbial populations compared with people with healthy skin. Bacteria associated with atopic dermatitis express genes for survival in dry conditions and for ammonia production, modulating the pH of this distinct environment and driving complex ecological interactions.

Accurate estimates of disease burden are possible by building high-resolution geographical models. However, novel pathogens such as Zika virus pose substantial challenges, requiring both new analytical techniques and, where possible, serological surveys.

Protein-synthesizing bacterial and archaeal cells can now be visualized by an adaptation of the BONCAT method, and sorted from complex samples for sequencing. A demonstration on the uncultivated, slow-growing methane-oxidizing consortia shows the high potential of this new method.

Non-structural protein-1 (NS1) of dengue virus (DENV) and Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) are secreted into the serum of an infected host where they facilitate virus transmission by overcoming the immune barrier in the midgut of their mosquito vector.

Long colonic transit times are associated with high microbial richness and a shift towards protein catabolism, whilst short transit times are associated with a possible increase in colonic mucosa renewal.

In Vibrio cholerae, which has two chromosomes, Chr2 rather than Chr1 harbours binding motifs for an inhibitor of Z-ring formation. This helps accurately position the divisome at mid-cell and postpones its assembly to the very end of the cell cycle.

Depending on its dimorphic life cycle, Caulobacter crescentus differentially initiates an efflux or chemotactic response to avoid copper toxicity.

Modulation of the gut microbiota in mice with oral treatment of W27 immunoglobulin A had a therapeutic effect on lymphoproliferative disease and colitis models in mice.

The skin microbiome in patients prone to atopic dermatitis is enriched in Streptococcus and Gemella, and is associated with an adaptive immune response, an altered eukaryotic community and a functional shift in the microbiome-wide gene repertoire.

A phylogenetic approach was used to illuminate the physiology of the last universal common ancestor, supporting the theory that LUCA was an H₂-dependent autotroph in a hydrothermal setting rich in hydrogen, carbon dioxide and iron.

That the Zika virus epidemic could result in infections of 1.65 million childbearing women and 93.4 million people suggests an approach that combines epidemiological theory with data on seroprevalence and drivers of transmission to make location-specific projections.

The cryoEM structures of Ebola virus GP and sGP in complex with GP-specific and GP/sGP cross-reactive antibodies provides insight into the oligomeric arrangement of sGP and a comparison of its structure and epitope presentation with GP.

Spatial correlation between microbial communities and chemical gradients within a lake system was observed, with few organisms capable of sulphate reduction, supporting microbial cooperation for geochemical functioning

Mycobacterium tuberculosis PE_PGRS47 is required to evade autophagy and prevent MHC-II antigen presentation during infection.