The gut microbiota metabolizes bile acids, thereby influencing human health and diseases including obesity, colitis and cancer. In this Review, Patterson and colleagues discuss host–microbiota interactions and their influence on the bile acid pool as well as therapeutic implications.

In this Review, Rogers, Mileto and Lyras explore the impact of enteric bacterial infections at and beyond the epithelial barrier. They highlight how different bacterial pathogens disrupt structural first line defences of the gut, the influence this has on the systemic dissemination of gut contents, the acute inflammatory processes that are triggered and the collective implication of these events on the regeneration of efficient barrier functions.

Like the gut, the lung harbours a diverse, interacting assortment of microbiota. In this review, Natalini, Singh and Segal examine the role of the lung microbiome in health and disease and discuss future work that is needed to produce novel diagnostic and therapeutic tools aimed at improving lung health.

This study reports that some bacterial species of the Lachnospiraceae family can suppress colorectal cancer progression by modulating CD8⁺ T cell immune surveillance activity.

This study reports that heat treatment can increase the bactericidal activity of aminoglycosides against multi-drug resistant pathogens.

This study reports how fluid flow is linked to changes in gene expression in bacterial pathogens.

This study shows the development of a chimeric dengue virus bivalent vaccine that generated serotype-specific neutralizing antibodies in vivo.

A recent study uncovered a relationship between sensory neurons and immune cells in the meninges that facilitates brain invasion by two Streptococcus species and the development of meningitis in mice.

This study reveals a role of contractile injection systems in regulated cell death and developmental processes.