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A recent study found that Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection in mice reprogrammes haematopoietic stem cells, limiting myelopoiesis and impairing trained immunity.
In this Review, Corrigan and colleagues explore the broad range of metabolic pathways that guanosine pentaphosphate, guanosine tetraphosphate and guanosine 5′-monophosphate 3′-diphosphate regulate in the bacterial cell and emphasize the importance of these alarmones in regulating diverse metabolic processes. Moreover, they examine the contribution of these alarmones to virulence and chronic infection.
In this Review, Chen, Boyaci and Campbell examine universal pathways and diverse regulatory mechanisms in transcription initiation in evolutionarily divergent bacteria, and they discuss the mechanisms whereby antimicrobials inhibit transcription initiation and the insights those mechanisms provide into the transcription cycle.
In this Review, Thiel and colleagues discuss the key aspects of coronavirus biology and their implications for SARS-CoV-2 infections as well as for treatment and prevention strategies.
In this Review, Morais, Schreiber and Mazmanian discuss emerging and exciting evidence of intricate and potentially important connections between the gut microbiota and the brain involving multiple biological systems, and possible contributions by the gut microbiota to complex behaviours.
Culturing microorganisms is a priority to complement the flood of genomic data illuminating archaeal and bacterial diversity. In this Review, Ettema and colleagues highlight recent successes in culturing elusive lineages, innovative methods and key targets for future cultivation.
Recent crystallography and electron microscopy studies have refined our model of herpesvirus entry into cells. In this Review, Connolly, Jardetzky and Longnecker discuss recent insights into herpesvirus entry by analysing the structures of entry glycoproteins, including the diverse receptor-binding glycoproteins and conserved fusion proteins.
In this Perspective, Su, Du and Jiang discuss lessons from previous vaccine development efforts for other viruses and how the mechanisms of vaccine-associated disease enhancement seen in some viral infections can inform the development of a safe and efficacious COVID-19 vaccine.
In this Review, Vandenberg et al. explore the crucial role of diagnostic tests during the first global wave of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the technical and implementation problems encountered during the early phase of the pandemic, and they define future directions for the progressive and better use of diagnostics during a possible resurgence of COVID-19 in future global waves or regional outbreaks.
This study provides evidence that bacterial nanotubes produced by Bacillus subtilis and other bacteria are a feature of cell death rather than physiological structures.
A global assessment of the structure and function of the crop microbiome is urgently needed for the development of effective and rationally designed microbiome technologies for sustainable agriculture. Such an effort will provide new knowledge on the key ecological and evolutionary interactions between plant species and their microbiomes that can be harnessed for increasing agriculture productivity.
This study provides insights into how a mycovirus decreases the pathogenicity of its fungal host and promotes plant defences, and how this can be translated into the development of a plant vaccine.
The rapid emergence of antibiotic resistance is recognized as a major public health threat. Nanomaterials have risen to tackle this problem through either improving the potency of existing antibiotics or generating entirely new antibacterial mechanisms.
Viruses are extremely diverse and not all of this diversity has been captured so far. In this Review, Martínez Martínez, Martinez-Hernandez and Martinez-Garcia explore the potential and limitations of single-virus genomics and how this emerging technology can complement other methods.
