Comment

Persistence of the transcriptionally active HIV reservoir has important implications for people living with HIV, including chronic immune activation and inflammation. Supplementing antiretroviral therapy with transcriptional inhibitors could overcome this by silencing the transcriptionally active HIV reservoir.

The tree of life is a galvanizing image, anchoring biological diversity within a common framework. From a new view in 2016, the tree has continued to grow, and with it, our understanding of life on earth.

Analyses refuting the dogma that a quarter of the world’s population is latently infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis emphasize the need for a redirection of research priorities.

A participatory research initiative generates actionable data on avian diseases in New York City, showcases how a community-based approach can tackle misinformation, and actively engages students from historically underrepresented communities in science, technology, engineering and maths.

In vitro models mimicking in-patient conditions have the potential to yield exciting opportunities for antibiotic research and revitalize future antibiotic discovery and development.

The spread of vector-borne infectious diseases is driven by a complex array of environmental and social drivers, including climate and land-use changes. Global and regional action is urgently needed to tackle carbon emissions and deforestation to halt future outbreaks.

Increased heat tolerance in fungi with pathogenic potential due to global warming could bring new fungal diseases.

Climate changes can destabilize soil microbial communities, but compound and sequential extreme climate events will magnify the destabilizing effects to other trophic levels — thereby impacting terrestrial biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.

The unprecedented extent of highly pathogenic avian influenza coincides with intensifying global climate changes that alter host ecology and physiology, and could impact virus evolution and dynamics.

Critical thresholds are abrupt changes in ecosystems triggered by environmental disturbances, which can be used to assess resilience and vulnerability. Here, we propose how a trait-based approach could be used to harness the predictive power of microbial dynamics to manage ecosystem response to environmental changes.

The Nagoya Protocol was drafted to ensure the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the international use of genetic resources, but the lack of unified procedures and unclear definitions relating to microorganisms present considerable hurdles to microbiology research.

The global outbreak of H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza virus and its high toll on animal populations raise concerns about spillover into humans, but human host barriers need to be considered when estimating transmission potential.

An integrated science–policy–society interface that explicitly considers soil microbiomes is needed to achieve One Health goals.

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.

The extent and diversity of exposures to microbial stimuli have a crucial role in regulating the capacity of a host to mount an immune response to a challenge, such as vaccination, making exposure history an important factor to optimize in rodent models.

The SARS-CoV-2 Africa dashboard is an interactive tool that enables visualization of SARS-CoV-2 genomic information in African countries. The customizable app allows users to visualize the number of sequences deposited in each country, and the variants circulating over time. Our dashboard enables near real-time exploration of public data that can inform policymakers, healthcare professionals and the public about the ongoing pandemic.

Here the implications of gender inequity in the face of infectious disease outbreaks such as Ebola and SARS-CoV-2 in Africa are discussed, with a proposal as to how we can address the unequal burden of outbreaks on women.

Despite evidence of sex-specific pathogenesis, few studies of infectious diseases report or analyse sex or gender, unless it is the primary focus. Using HIV as an example, it is argued here that this leaves potentially informative data unexplored and that integrating sex and gender in analyses may accelerate research in microbial pathogenesis.

Understanding the interplay between the microbiome and menopause holds promise for new interventions to alleviate menopausal symptoms and improve quality of life for women.

Space exploration carries with it risks of biological contamination. Here, the planetary protection efforts currently in place to control microbial contamination during space exploration are discussed, including plans related to sample and crew returns to Earth from other Solar System destinations such as Mars.