Volume 8 Issue 5, May 2023

Evidence that bacterial infection shapes susceptibility to recurrent UTI via epigenetic memory shows that integrated approaches that consider host and pathogen are essential to develop effective treatments.

Diagnosis is the weakest aspect of tuberculosis (TB) care and control. We describe seven critical transitions that can close the massive TB diagnostic gap and enable TB programmes worldwide to recover from the pandemic setbacks.

Dysbiosis of the gut microbiome confers alterations in appetitive and metabolic regulation of body weight in anorexia nervosa in humans and mice.

Almost twenty years after it was first linked to control of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in macrophages, autophagy retakes centre stage, as shown in murine models and human cells.

Bladder epithelial cells exposed to uropathogenic Escherichia coli infection have long-lasting epigenetic modifications linked with inflammation that influence host susceptibility to subsequent infections.

Breakthroughs in developing an effective human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) vaccine have been rare despite decades of effort. By combining vaccination with a topical microbicide that also potentiates vaccine-induced immunity, 16 out of 20 female macaques were protected against vaginal acquisition of the highly pathogenic simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV).

Previous studies have suggested the presence of a ‘blood microbiome’. Here, we analysed sequencing data generated from the blood of 9,770 healthy individuals and found no evidence for a common blood microbiome in these individuals.

Therapeutics for COVID-19 and their development during a pandemic are reviewed, including future prospects for anticoronavirals.

Faecal metagenomics and serum metabolomics reveal compositional and functional alterations in the gut microbiota of women with anorexia nervosa, and faecal transplants could transfer an anorexia-associated phenotype to germ-free mice.

Autophagy proteins differentially control Mycobacterium tuberculosis replication in human macrophages.

Autophagy-mediated control of Mycobacterium tuberculosis acute infection in mice is uncovered by more complete knockouts in autophagy pathway genes.

Detection of persistent replication-competent HIV in monocytes from virologically suppressed people with HIV indicates that monocytes have a role as a latent reservoir.

Comprehensive multi-omics of Babesia duncani reveals evolution, drug sensitivity and virulence.

Comparison of mucosal and systemic immunity after vaccination with the live-attenuated vaccine sCPD9, mRNA vaccine BNT162b2 or an adenovirus-vectored vaccine following SARS-CoV-2 challenge in hamsters.

Uropathogenic Escherichia coli infection induces epigenetic remodelling and trained immune responses in bladder epithelial stem cells that affect susceptibility to recurrent infection.

Chronic differentiation in Toxoplasma gondii is controlled by a positive feedback loop between BFD1 and BFD2.

Topical microbicide combined with vaccine effectively prevents infection of female macaques with simian immunodeficiency virus.

Statins have anti-cancer effects that are modulated by the gut commensal Lactobacillus reuteri and the tryptophan metabolite, indole-3-lactic acid, in mice and humans.

ProBac-seq is a method that uses libraries of DNA probes and commercial microfluidics for single-cell RNA-seq, leveraged here to show heterogeneous gene expression in clonal bacterial cultures including variable toxin expression in an agricultural strain of Clostridium.

Metagenomics and Hi-C proximity-ligation sequencing show that viruses in dense microbial communities can interact with multiple, distantly related microbial hosts.

The autophagy receptor SHISA9 balances innate immune responses during viral infection by controlling the levels of inhibitor of nuclear factor κB kinase subunit epsilon to restrict pathogenic inflammation in the central nervous system.

A large population study indicates that there is no core blood microbiome in healthy humans.

Faecal viromes of 647 healthy infants were deeply sequenced to identify more than 230 previously undescribed gut virus families, expanding known diversity within the human infant gut virome.