Frontiers in Microbiology | New and Recent Articles

Streptococcus anginosus (S. anginosus, SA), a facultatively anaerobic coccus, functions as both a commensal bacterium and an opportunistic pathogen. It is frequently associated with localized suppurative infections and abscess formation. Increasing evidence implicates it as an emerging pathogen that can trigger gastritis and gastric cancer. This review synthesizes current knowledge with emphasis …

Microbial communities shape life at every stratum of environmental hierarchy, ranging from a wide spectrum of functionalities such as nutrient cycling processes that support ecosystem functioning in soil biome to those of intricate balance between disease causal and responsive immune defenses in animals. This review explores the roles of microbial niches in shaping pathogen persistence, antimicro…

In recent years, with the growing population of immunocompromised individuals, infections caused by rare environmental molds have become increasingly prevalent and clinically significant. Due to frequent misdiagnosis and difficult clinical management, the overall disease burden of such infections poses a major challenge in clinical practice. This article aims to fill the knowledge gap by reviewin…

ObjectiveThe gut microbiome gets altered during ischemic stroke (IS); however, whether distinct microbial signatures characterize specific IS subtypes, such as large-artery atherosclerosis (LAA) and small-vessel occlusion (SVO), and their relation to subtype-specific clinical features, remains unclear. This study aimed at comparing gut microbiome profiles among patients with LAA, patients with SV…

Dilute methane from coal-mine ventilation, drainage systems, and abandoned workings is difficult to treat because low methane partial pressure coincides with high or variable gas flow, short feasible residence times, fluctuating temperature and humidity, nutrient scarcity, and dust or trace contaminants. Aerobic methanotrophs can oxidize methane under moderate conditions, but mine-relevant perfor…

The acid-tolerant yeast Issatchenkia orientalis is a promising platform for the sustainable production of organic acids. However, the inefficient conversion of lignocellulosic biomass-derived sugars, primarily due to carbon catabolite repression (CCR), reduces overall production efficiency and limits its industrial application. In this study, we established a targeted genetic framework for effici…

BackgroundSoil is a common form of trace evidence in forensic investigations, and its indigenous microbial communities hold promise for geographic provenance determination. However, most existing studies focus on macro-scale soil microbial patterns, with limited understanding of their small-scale spatiotemporal dynamics. This study collected soil samples across multiple time points from a small-s…

IntroductionActivation of human endogenous retroviral elements (HERV) is a well-documented phenomenon in inflammatory pathologies including COVID-19, with HERVW ENV frequently mentioned as a toxic protein. Given that COVID-19 during pregnancy has been associated with placental damage and a higher risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes (APOs), we investigated whether gestational COVID-19 alters placen…

The rational application of potassium (K) is essential for soil nutrient transformation in orchards. Microbial communities drive phosphorus (P) transformation and activation, yet their responses to potassium (K) gradients and the underlying regulation of functional potential remain unclear. Accordingly, a field trial was conducted on 7- to 8-year-old Korla pear trees to evaluate changes in microb…

IntroductionLong-term grazing exclusion is widely used to restore degraded grasslands, yet whether its effects on soil microbial metabolism–particularly nutrient limitation and carbon use efficiency (CUE)–vary among grassland types remains poorly understood.MethodsWe investigated three typical grassland types in Xinjiang, China: temperate desert (TD), temperate steppe (TS), and mountain meadow (M…

Monkeypox virus (MPXV) has caused two Public Health Emergencies of International Concern since 2022, with co-circulation of distinct clades (Ia, Ib, IIa, IIb) that differ in virulence and transmission patterns. Rapid discrimination of these clades is critical for outbreak control and clinical management. Here, we developed and validated a two-tube multiplex real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) assay…

IntroductionChanging frequency and intensity of dust emissions impacts ecosystems and human health. Dust carries microbes, nutrients, heavy metals, and other materials that may change environmental biogeochemistry at deposition sites. Identifying dust sources provides key information on where and when mitigation strategies should be employed. However, commonly used geochemical or isotopic tracers…

BackgroundThe research on the gut microbiota of neonates and preterm neonates by conventional feeding methods is still limited.ObjectiveThis study aimed to systematically characterize gut microbiota variations across three feeding methods in neonates, with a specific focus on preterm neonates.MethodsThis study included 265 neonates from the Hunan Children’s Hospital cohort, categorized by feeding…

IntroductionHigh-salt diet (HSD) has been shown to influence cognition and emotional behavior in mice via gut microbiota modulation, yet its chronic effects in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology remain poorly understood. This study aimed to investigate whether long-term HSD exacerbates cognitive and emotional deficits in APP/PS1 transgenic mice and to explore the underlying gut–brain axis mechani…

Intensive cucumber continuous cropping disrupts rhizosphere balance and triggers severe Meloidogyne incognita infestation. Cucumber-pepper rotation alleviates this via recruiting the rhizobacteria Pseudarthrobacter oxydans RH60. However, the mediating role of rhizobacterial interaction networks remains unclear. Here, we clarified the bidirectional regulatory mechanism of this nematode disease via…

Antimicrobial resistance in multidrug-resistant Escherichia coli has severely compromised the efficacy of conventional antibiotics, particularly in hospital-acquired infections. Bacteriophage therapy offers a targeted approach, yet the rapid emergence of phage-resistant mutants during monotherapy limits its durability. However, phage cocktail therapy can overcome this issue. In this study, we iso…

Food safety has attracted extensive global attention, making the development of efficient and rapid detection methods essential for food safety risk control. Argonaute-based biosensing has emerged as a promising tool for food safety analysis owing to its unique advantages, including high recognition specificity, low constraints on target sequences, stable and cost-effective guides, and ease of mu…

Coffee (Coffea arabica L. and Coffea canephora Pierre ex A. Froehner) is a globally important perennial plantation crop that sustains the livelihoods of millions of smallholder farmers while making substantial contributions to agricultural economies worldwide global agricultural economies. Nevertheless, sustainable coffee production is increasingly constrained by climate change, declining soil fe…

IntroductionThere is a rising prevalence of root pathogens of the genus Fusarium on coffee (Coffea arabica) farms in Saudi Arabia. The current study aimed to explore the antagonistic mechanisms involved in the interaction between four Trichoderma spp. isolated from coffee rhizospheres and two different strains of Fusarium spp., namely Fusarium oxysporum and Fusarium brachygibbosum. The main hypot…