816 papers
This study reveals that giant viruses encode functional vitamin K epoxide reductase (VKOR) homologs, often organized with epoxidase and desaturase domains, which act as catalytically competent electron shuttles to manipulate host redox metabolism and drive lipid remodeling during infection.
This study demonstrates that the cellular esterase FrmB is essential for *Staphylococcus aureus* metabolic homeostasis by regulating pyruvate dehydrogenase activity, thereby enabling efficient pyruvate utilization and the formation of clinically significant small colony variants associated with chronic infection and antibiotic resistance.
This study reveals that while clinical *Klebsiella pneumoniae* urinary tract infection isolates exhibit highly heterogeneous phenotypes that shift in response to urine, they all successfully colonize the urinary tract, suggesting the existence of shared, yet unidentified, fitness factors driving their uropathogenesis.
This study demonstrates that the cyanobacterial c-di-GMP receptor CdgR regulates type IV pilus-dependent functions, such as phototaxis and natural competence, by interacting with transcription factors SyCRP1 and SyCRP2 to modulate minor pilin gene expression in response to cyclic nucleotide signaling.
This study utilizes metagenomic and 16S rRNA sequencing to characterize the bacterial communities of deep-sea *Pheronema carpenteri* Hexactinellid sponges, revealing a diverse microbiome with potential nitrogen cycling capabilities and limited biosynthetic gene clusters, thereby challenging traditional classifications of Hexactinellids as low microbial abundance sponges and highlighting their ecological and biotechnological significance.
This study reveals that the cGAS-mediated type I interferon response during human cytomegalovirus infection in vitro is primarily triggered by contaminating exogenous DNA in viral stock preparations rather than the viral genome itself, underscoring the critical need to control for such contaminants when interpreting innate immune sensing mechanisms.
This study provides the first evidence that Dengue virus non-structural protein 1 (NS1) directly disrupts lymphatic endothelial cell function by causing junctional disorganization and migration defects, leading to lymphatic hyperpermeability that likely contributes to the fluid accumulation and shock seen in severe dengue.
This study demonstrates that *Ustilago maydis* infection remodels the maize phyllosphere microbiome by selectively eliminating health-associated bacteria via the antimicrobial effector GH25 while promoting disease-associated communities, a process that relies on GH25 activity to maintain fungal virulence.
This study reveals that a gas-phase environment activates an alternative, toluene dioxygenase-independent catabolic route involving cresol intermediates and phenol monooxygenase in *Acinetobacter* sp. Tol 5, enabling toluene degradation under vapor conditions where liquid culture fails.
This study characterizes Phospholipase A1 (PLA1) in *Leishmania amazonensis* and *L. infantum*, revealing its expression, biochemical properties, and a novel association with lipid droplets that suggests a specialized role in parasite lipid metabolism and pathogenesis.
This study characterizes the large, diverse, and structurally dynamic pQBR mercury resistance plasmids from environmental *Pseudomonas* as a tractable model system for understanding how pre-antimicrobial resistance plasmids interact with transposable elements to acquire and mobilize novel chromosomal traits.
This study reveals that GAPM proteins across *Plasmodium* species form an obligate heterotrimeric complex that bridges the glideosome and cytoskeleton, providing a unified structural model for parasite motility and invasion.
This study reveals that the polar growth factor PgfA coordinates the synthesis of peptidoglycan and mycolic acid layers in *Mycobacterium smegmatis* by acting as a TMM-dependent switch that inhibits peptidoglycan metabolism when unbound but promotes it when bound to trehalose monomycolate lipids.
This study reveals that in *Escherichia coli*, the nucleoid-associated protein H-NS acts as a temperature-sensitive structural scaffold that undergoes a conformational switch at 37°C to organize the genome and stimulate initial growth, a mechanism that is more critical for host adaptation than its traditional role as a gene silencer.
This study demonstrates that a truncated soil bacteriophage catechol 1,2-dioxygenase retains its core catalytic structure and exhibits superior environmental stability compared to bacterial homologs, highlighting how viruses preserve and disseminate auxiliary metabolic functions to expand host versatility in dynamic soil ecosystems.
This study reveals that the WalRK two-component system in *Streptococcus pneumoniae* maintains cell wall homeostasis by sensing and compensating for the loss of capsule attachment via CpsA through the positive regulation of peptidoglycan hydrolases, thereby ensuring the robust attachment of secondary wall polymers.
This study demonstrates that the ssRNA bacteriophage PRR1 specifically targets the Type IV secretion system of IncP plasmids to block antibiotic resistance gene transfer without requiring a full infection cycle, highlighting its potential as a novel strategy to suppress the spread of multidrug-resistant bacteria.
By integrating image-enabled cell sorting, single-nucleus RNA sequencing, and proteomic profiling, this study reveals that the majority of the diatom *Pseudo-nitzschia multistriata* population is transcriptionally committed to sexual reproduction, indicating that the primary bottleneck to successful mating occurs downstream of the initial signaling phase.
This study establishes a sequence-defined arrayed transposon library for *Streptococcus mutans* to identify novel biofilm determinants while revealing that high rates of spontaneous genomic instability, particularly at the *gtfBC* locus, necessitate systematic whole-genome verification to avoid misattributing phenotypes in functional genomics.
This study reveals that *Trichomonas vaginalis* exhibits pH taxis and selective chemotactic migration toward *Lactobacillus gasseri* over *Gardnerella vaginalis* or *Escherichia coli*, a behavior that promotes parasite growth and may destabilize protective vaginal microbiota to drive dysbiosis.