Hot off the presses! Jun 01 Nature Reviews Microbiology

The Jun 01 issue of the Nature Reviews Microbiology is now up on Pubget (About Nature Reviews Microbiology): if you're at a subscribing institution, just click the link in the latest link at the home page. (Note you'll only be able to get all the PDFs in the issue if your institution subscribes to Pubget.)

Latest Articles Include:

• In this issue
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):383 (2010)
  All organisms must acquire carbon from their environment for the generation of energy and the production of macromolecules such as proteins and lipids. Archaea use several different carbon fixation mechanisms, depending on the environment in which they are found.
• Editorial: Biodiversity 2010: the tip of the iceberg
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):384 (2010)
  This year is the United Nations' International Year of Biodiversity, which provides us with an opportunity to take stock of efforts to assess the impact of human activities on global species diversity. In some of the more remote parts of the world, efforts to limit our impact seem to be having a positive effect.
• Virology: Cleaving the tether
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):385 (2010)
  Tetherin (also known as BST2) restricts enveloped viruses by preventing their release from the surface of infected cells. However, several viruses have developed strategies to circumvent this restriction.
• Bacterial pathogenesis: Targeting SUMO
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):386 (2010)
  One of the mechanisms by which intracellular bacteria, such as Listeria monocytogenes, subvert host cell functions is to interfere with host protein post-translational modifications such as ubiquitylation, which alter protein function and stability. Cossart and colleagues now show that L. monocytogenes
• In brief: Marine microbiology, Bacterial physiology, Innate immunity
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):386 (2010)
  Proteorhodopsin phototrophy promotes survival of marine bactera during starvation Gómez-Consarnau, L.et al. PLoS Biol. 8, e100358 (2010)
• Environmental microbiology: You are what you eat
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):387 (2010)
  The bacteria in the human gut provide their host with energy by degrading dietary polysaccharides. Writing in Nature, Hehemann et al.
• Innate immunity: The stress connection
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):387 (2010)
  Smoking and prolonged stress have been linked to increased susceptibility to bacterial infection. New research in Cell Host and Microbe now shows that this may be caused by a decrease in antimicrobial peptide (AMP) activity as a result of increased stimulation of a neuroendocrine signalling pathway.
• Fungal ecology: Chaos reigns at low temperatures
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):388 (2010)
  Environmental factors such as temperature and pressure alter the structure and function of macromolecules in the cell and so define the physiochemical window for microbial growth. For example, growth is limited at low temperatures owing to an increase in non-covalent interactions among macromolecules that results in the molecules and cellular membranes becoming more rigid.
• Quorum sensing: Setting the threshold
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):388 (2010)
  A negative regulator that controls the activation threshold for quorum sensing in Pseudomonas aeruginosa has been identified, according to a new report from Richard Siehnel, Pradeep Singh and colleagues.Quorum sensing allows bacteria to communicate with each other through the production and perception of small extracellular signal molecules such as acyl homoserine lactones (HSLs).
• Bacterial pathogenesis: Opening the gates of type III secretion
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):389 (2010)
  Bacterial pathogens subvert host cell pathways by using type III secretion systems (T3SSs) to deliver bacterial effectors through a translocon pore into the host cytosol. Three studies, each investigating a different organism, now show that type III secretion is controlled by changes in the oxygen level and by the pH in the host cell.
• Attack of the clones
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):390 (2010)
  This month's Genome Watch discusses two recent examples of the use of next-generation sequencing techniques in public health settings.
• In the news
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):391 (2010)
  Many experts think that the 2012 target for the eradiction of polio is likely to be missed, but hope has been renewed following the remarkable success of anti-polio programmes in Nigeria and India, two global hotspots for polio infection. In Nigeria, improved funding and management of public health programmes coupled with better ties between such programmes and local Muslim leaders, who had previously obstructed efforts to combat polio, have resulted in only 2 children becoming paralyzed with polio so far this year compared with 123 during the same period last year.
• Molecular mechanisms of complement evasion: learning from staphylococci and meningococci
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):393 (2010)
  The complement system is a crucial component of the innate immune response in humans. Recent studies in Staphylococcus aureus and Neisseria meningitidis have revealed how these bacteria escape complement-mediated killing. In addition, new structural data have provided detailed insights into the molecular mechanisms of host defence mediated by the complement system and how bacterial proteins interfere with this process. This information is fundamental to our understanding of bacterial pathogenesis and may facilitate the design of better vaccines.
• Carbon metabolism of intracellular bacterial pathogens and possible links to virulence
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):401 (2010)
  New technologies such as high-throughput methods and 13C-isotopologue-profiling analysis are beginning to provide us with insight into the in vivo metabolism of microorganisms, especially in the host cell compartments that are colonized by intracellular bacterial pathogens. In this Review, we discuss the recent progress made in determining the major carbon sources and metabolic pathways used by model intracellular bacterial pathogens that replicate either in the cytosol or in vacuoles of infected host cells. Furthermore, we highlight the possible links between intracellular carbon metabolism and the expression of virulence genes.
• Behind the smile: cell biology and disease mechanisms of Giardia species
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):413 (2010)
  The eukaryotic intestinal parasite Giardia intestinalis was first described in 1681, when Antonie van Leeuwenhoek undertook a microscopic examination of his own diarrhoeal stool. Nowadays, although G. intestinalis is recognized as a major worldwide contributor to diarrhoeal disease in humans and other mammals, the disease mechanisms are still poorly understood. Owing to its reduced complexity and proposed early evolutionary divergence, G. intestinalis is used as a model eukaryotic system for studying many basic cellular processes. In this Review we discuss recent discoveries in the molecular cell biology and pathogenesis of G. intestinalis.
• How antibiotics kill bacteria: from targets to networks
  Kohanski MA Dwyer DJ Collins JJ - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):423 (2010)
  Antibiotic drug–target interactions, and their respective direct effects, are generally well characterized. By contrast, the bacterial responses to antibiotic drug treatments that contribute to cell death are not as well understood and have proven to be complex as they involve many genetic and biochemical pathways. In this Review, we discuss the multilayered effects of drug–target interactions, including the essential cellular processes that are inhibited by bactericidal antibiotics and the associated cellular response mechanisms that contribute to killing. We also discuss new insights into these mechanisms that have been revealed through the study of biological networks, and describe how these insights, together with related developments in synthetic biology, could be exploited to create new antibacterial therapies.
• Building Fe–S proteins: bacterial strategies
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):436 (2010)
  The broad range of cellular activities carried out by Fe–S proteins means that they have a central role in the life of most organisms. At the interface between biology and chemistry, studies of bacterial Fe–S protein biogenesis have taken advantage of the specific approaches of each field and have begun to reveal the molecular mechanisms involved. The multiprotein systems that are required to build Fe–S proteins have been identified, but the in vivo roles of some of the components remain to be clarified. The way in which cellular Fe–S cluster trafficking pathways are organized remains a key issue for future studies.
• Autotrophic carbon fixation in archaea
  - Nature Reviews Microbiology 8(6):447 (2010)
  The acquisition of cellular carbon from inorganic carbon is a prerequisite for life and marked the transition from the inorganic to the organic world. Recent theories of the origins of life assume that chemoevolution took place in a hot volcanic flow setting through a transition metal-catalysed, autocatalytic carbon fixation cycle. Many archaea live in volcanic habitats under such constraints, in high temperatures with only inorganic substances and often under anoxic conditions. In this Review, we describe the diverse carbon fixation mechanisms that are found in archaea. These reactions differ fundamentally from those of the well-known Calvin cycle, and their distribution mirrors the phylogenetic positions of the archaeal lineages and the needs of the ecological niches that they occupy.