768 papers
Microbiology explores the invisible world of tiny life forms that shape our health, environment, and even the air we breathe. From bacteria and viruses to fungi and parasites, this field investigates how these microscopic organisms interact with us and each other, driving everything from disease outbreaks to beneficial fermentation processes. Understanding them is crucial for developing new medicines, improving food safety, and combating global health challenges.
At Gist.Science, we make the latest discoveries in this dynamic field accessible to everyone. We process every new preprint uploaded to bioRxiv in this category, transforming dense academic findings into both clear, plain-language explanations and detailed technical summaries. This ensures that whether you are a student, a researcher, or simply curious, you can grasp the significance of cutting-edge science without getting lost in jargon.
Below are the most recent papers in microbiology, curated and summarized directly from the bioRxiv server to keep you at the forefront of discovery.
PhagePickr is a novel, bacteria-centric computational pipeline that designs resistance-aware phage cocktails by selecting phages based on bacterial surface receptor similarity and genomic diversity to minimize the risk of host resistance evolution.
The paper proposes complementing existing Biosafety Levels with new Societal Safety Levels (SSLs) that quantify expected public fatalities to ensure high-risk pandemic pathogen research meets enforceable safety thresholds comparable to other hazardous industries, thereby better protecting the non-consenting public from potential laboratory releases.
This study reveals that maternal gut plasmids, particularly those associated with *Bacteroides* and enriched in mobilization and stability genes, are frequently shared with infants during the first three months of life regardless of delivery mode, but this transmission diminishes by 12 months.
Despite significant host specialization and genome-wide differentiation between wheat- and barley-adapted *Puccinia striiformis*, a conserved tetrapolar mating system on the alternate host *Berberis vulgaris* enables sexual hybridization that produces viable progeny with novel, recombinant host interaction profiles.
Prior exposure to Bombyx mori latent virus (BmLV) enhances subsequent Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) infection in silkworm larvae by suppressing the induction of key host antiviral genes, thereby increasing viral replication and protein expression.
This study reports the first successful implementation of a thermostable CRISPR-Cas9 system in the extremophile *Anaerocellum bescii*, enabling efficient gene deletions and the creation of a tryptophan auxotrophic strain for improved vector selection and maintenance.
This study demonstrates that combining ACER broth pre-enrichment with qPCR significantly enhances the detection of *Burkholderia pseudomallei* in naturally contaminated Thai soils compared to Ashdown enrichment or direct culture, although culture methods remain less sensitive than molecular techniques even after enrichment.
This study demonstrates that pH-neutral medium-chain fatty acids (MCFAs) act as effective adjuvants that synergize with bacteriophages to enhance killing of multidrug-resistant bacteria, disrupt biofilms, and prevent the emergence of phage resistance across diverse Gram-positive and Gram-negative pathogens.
This study identifies specific positively charged residues (R34, K45, and R49) on the LolB protein that are essential for its interaction with complementary negatively charged residues on the LolA chaperone, demonstrating that electrostatic forces mediate the critical transfer of lipoproteins during outer membrane trafficking.
By disentangling the independent effects of serotype and lineage in pneumococcal isolates from South Africa and the USA, this study identifies specific genetic determinants, such as *hk11* and *bgaA*, that drive the unexpectedly high invasiveness of the GPSC1 lineage compared to its closely related GPSC21 counterpart.