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Although there is currently no licensed vaccine against dengue virus (DENV), the chimeric yellow fever–DENV tetravalent dengue vaccine (CYD-TDV) has shown efficacy against DENV in two recent Phase III clinical trials. In this Opinion article, Guy and Jackson review the efficacy and safety data from these recent trials and discuss how interactions between the virus, pre-existing host immunity and vaccine-induced immune responses explain CYD-TDV-mediated protection.
In this Opinion article, Herskovits and colleagues introduce an emerging class of bacteria–phage symbiotic interaction — which they term 'active lysogeny' — in which phages regulate the expression of bacterial genes by precise insertion and excision events.
Following host cell invasion, many bacterial and parasitic pathogens hide from the immune system in an intracellular vacuolar niche. In this Opinion article, Mota and colleagues discuss how these 'professional' vacuolar pathogens can remain susceptible to recognition and clearance by the host.
In this Opinion article, López-Garcíaet al. describe recent archaeal phylogenomic data relating to the massive acquisition of bacterial genes by horizontal gene transfer. They argue that the findings presented suggest that the import of these bacterial genes was crucial for the adaptation of archaea to mesophilic lifestyles.
In this Opinion article, James Prosser considers the conceptual limitations of metagenomics and metatranscriptomics in contributing to our understanding of soil microbial ecology, and also explores potential opportunities for using these techniques to address specific ecological questions.
Chemical dispersants are routinely applied during oil spills in marine ecosystems, yet little is known about how they affect microbial communities. Here, Joye and colleagues explore how dispersants affect the composition and activity of microbial communities and discuss crucial knowledge gaps that should guide future research efforts.
Mignot and colleagues present an evolutionary scenario to explain the emergence of the two distinct machines — the Agl–Glt and Agl–Nfs complexes — that are involved in motility and assembly of the spore coat inMyxococcus xanthus. They argue that elucidation of the composition and mechanism of action of these complexes will improve our understanding of the evolution of macromolecular complexes.
Antibiotic resistance constitutes a threat to human and animal health worldwide. Here, Manaia and colleagues report the main findings of the European COST (Cooperation in Science and Technology) Action DARE (Detecting Evolutionary Hotspots of Antibiotic Resistance in Europe) and discuss the need for improved sampling of the environment and more comprehensive databases, as well as the policy and management options that should be considered as priorities to tackle antibiotic resistance in the environment.
In this Opinion article, Errington reviews the studies that describe the role of MreB in the determination and maintenance of rod cell shape in bacteria, and he presents a model to reconcile the conflicting data.
