Virus-host Protein Interactions of Plant-adapted Rhabdoviruses. from Michael M. Goodin and Byoung-Eun Min writing in Rhabdoviruses: Molecular Taxonomy, Evolution, Genomics, Ecology, Host-Vector Interactions, Cytopathology and Control : Rhabdoviruses belonging to the genus Nucleorhabdovirus are unique in that they have not only adapted to replication in both plant and invertebrate cells but they are nucleotrophic as well. Beyond their roles as plant pathogens, these viruses also serve as probes to provide insights into plant nuclear biology. read more ...

Vlora, an Abandoned PVC Factory at the Mediterranean Coast: Mercury Pollution, Threat to Humans, and Treatment Options from Pranvera Lazo and Jaroslav Reif writing in Bioremediation of Mercury: Current Research and Industrial Applications : North of Vlora in Albania is the site of a former chemical manufacturing complex consisting of a chlor-alkali factory and plants for the production of vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) and polyvinylchloride (PVC). The factory closed in 1992 and was completely destroyed during a civil uprising in 1997. It read more ...

M. Madan Babu presents a new book on Bacterial Gene Regulation and Transcriptional Networks Along with the strategic guidance of M. Madan Babu (Cambridge, UK) authors from around the world have joined forces to review and discuss the latest research observations and current theories in this highly topical and important area of microbiology. The first few chapters describe the components required for transcriptional regulation, elucidate their complexity and discuss the genome-scale theories that currently prevail by investigating a large read more ...

Water and Cations Flux During Sporulation and Germination from Daniela Bassi, Fabrizio Cappa and Pier Sandro Cocconcelli writing in Bacterial Spores: Current Research and Applications : Bacterial spore water uptake and solute permeability are hypothesised to play a central role during the sporulation and germination processes but the leading mechanisms are at now poorly understood. In this chapter, a state of the art and the last experiments to better study this topic are presented. In the first part, major questions are addressed to the read more ...

The new book on Quantitative Real-time PCR in Applied Microbiology edited by Martin Filion will be available for dispatch within the next 2 or 3 read more ...

What Maintains Plasmids Among Bacteria? from Francisco Dionisio, Teresa Nogueira, Luís M. Carvalho, Helena Mendes-Soares, Sílvia C. M. Mendonça, Iolanda Domingues, Bernardino Moreira and Ana M. Reis writing in Horizontal Gene Transfer in Microorganisms : The ubiquity of plasmids in nature contrasts with our ability to understand their maintenance. Despite the ability of plasmids to transfer across different bacterial taxonomic groups and to carry useful genes to bacterial cells, it is unclear which factors are read more ...

Yersinia pestis Metabolic Network from Ali Navid and Eivind Almaas writing in Yersinia : Systems Biology and Control : Bubonic plague is one of the deadliest diseases known to man. Unfortunately, despite all of our medical advances, we still do not have a working vaccine against this disease. Worse yet, discovery of anti-microbial resistant strains of Yersinia pestis , the causative agent of plague, could soon render our current therapeutic means ineffective. Unique characteristics of bacterial metabolism constitute one of the primary sets read more ...

Yersinia pseudotuberculosis Gene Expression in Plasma from Michael Marceau and Michel Simonet writing in Yersinia : Systems Biology and Control : Yersinia pseudotuberculosis is a septicemic pathogen for rodents and many other animals. However, in certain immunosuppressive conditions, it may also invade the human bloodstream and little is known about the physiological events that take place once the microorganism has entered this compartment. DNA arrays are powerful tools for comparing wide and complex RNA population samples and, therefore, read more ...

from Lyudmila Boyanova writing in Helicobacter pylori : The Helicobacter genus belongs to class Epsilonproteobacteria , orders Campylobacterales , family Helicobacteraceae and already involves >35 species. Recently, new gastric ( Helicobacter suis and Helicobacter baculiformis ) and enterohepatic ( Helicobacter equorum ) species have been reported. Helicobacter pylori is of primary importance for medicine, however, non- pylori Helicobacter species (NPHS), which naturally inhabit mammals (except humans) and birds, have been detected in read more ...

from Aleksandr Barinov, Alexander Bolotin, Philippe Langella, Emmanuelle Maguin, Maarten Van De Guchte writing in Lactic Acid Bacteria and Bifidobacteria: Current Progress in Advanced Research : Lactobacilli can be found in very diverse environments, ranging from plants and fermented food products to the mucosal surfaces of the human body, including the Gastro Intestinal tract. Like many other lactic acid bacteria, they are traditionally used in food fermentation, serving food preservation as well as flavor and texture development. In this read more ...

Genomics and Cellular Biology of Endospore Formation from Patrick Eichenberger writing in Bacillus : Cellular and Molecular Biology (Second edition) : Bacteria of the genera Bacillus and Clostridium can be found in two distinct states. In the vegetative state, bacteria are metabolically active and use available nutrients to grow and divide by binary fission, a process that generates two identical daughter cells. By contrast, when nutrients are scarce, a developmental program of endospore formation (sporulation) is initiated, resulting in the read more ...

Genome-wide DNA Methylation Analysis from Marcel W. Coolen and Susan J. Clark writing in Epigenetics: A Reference Manual : Over the past decades it has become ever more apparent that understanding the genome did not stop with unravelling the genetic code. Regulatory mechanisms are needed to determine which parts of the genome are active or inactive, and to form a memory system that can be passed on over multiple cell divisions for proper functioning of the cell. These mechanisms underpinning heritable gene regulation are encapsulated by the read more ...

from Luo et al (2011) in Microbial Population Genetics Genome sequence comparison has been an important method for understanding gene function and genome evolution since the early days of gene sequencing. Alignment of DNA sequences is the core process in comparative genomics. In recent years, an important new sequence-analysis task has emerged: comparing an entire genome with another. Several powerful alignment algorithms have been developed to align two or more sequences. MUMmer MUMmer is a system for rapidly aligning entire genomes, read more ...

from Luo et al (2011) in Microbial Population Genetics Comparative analysis is an increasingly important step in the annotation and analysis process of genome sequence data, allowing phenotypic differences between strains and species to be correlated with changes in the chromosomes. For example, comparative sequence analysis has enabled the identification of cis-regulatory regions and location of coding exons using purely computational means. Visual front-ends are necessary and important to make the process of viewing alignments intuitive read more ...

Durgadas P. Kasbekar and Kevin McCluskey present a new book on Neurospora : Genomics and Molecular Biology In this book, internationally recognised Neurospora experts critically review the most important research and demonstrate the breadth of applications to industrial biology, biofuels, agriculture, and human health. The opening chapter is an introduction to the organism. Following chapters cover topics such as: carotenoid biosynthesis, polysaccharide deconstruction, genome biology, genome recombination, gene regulation, signal read more ...

Genex: Data Analysis Software from Mikael Kubista, Vendula Rusnakova, David Svec, Björn Sjögreen and Ales Tichopad writing in Quantitative Real-time PCR in Applied Microbiology : As the qPCR field advances, the design of experiments and the analysis of data is becoming more important and more challenging. Calculation of relative expression of a reporter gene to a reference gene in pairs of samples using the ΔΔCq method is no longer sufficient. Studies are now designed using multiple markers, nested levels, exploring or read more ...

Genetics and evolution of hantaviruses from Tarja Sironen and Alexander Plyusnin writing in Bunyaviridae : Molecular and Cellular Biology : Hantaviruses are globally important human pathogens. They are emerging viruses, and both the number of different hantavirus species discovered, and the amount of human infections are increasing. The hantaviral sequence data set is rapidly growing, and several fully sequenced genomes have been reported. Until recently, rodents have been regarded as the main reservoir and evolutionary scene of read more ...

Genetic Resources for the Study of Epigenetic Gene Regulation in Maize from Andre Irsigler and Karen M. McGinnis writing in Epigenetics: A Reference Manual : Maize has served as an excellent model for the study of epigenetic gene regulation for the past several decades. The pioneering work of maize geneticists like Barbara McClintock, Alexander Brink, Marcus Rhoades, and others led to the observation of many fascinating phenomena that were later demonstrated to be epigenetically regulated events. Since these observations were made, a great read more ...

Genetic Determinants of Bacterial Pathogenicity from Gavin K. Paterson and Duncan J. Maskell writing in Bacterial Pathogenesis: Molecular and Cellular Mechanisms : Determinants of bacterial pathogenicity are encoded by different types of genetic elements. Of particular note are large loci including pathogenicity islands, bacteriophages, integrative and conjugative elements, plasmids and integrons. Gene loss can also play a significant role in determining bacterial pathogenicity and should not be disregarded. Here we discuss these main read more ...

General and Regulatory Proteolysis in Bacillus subtilis from Kürşad Turgay writing in Bacillus : Cellular and Molecular Biology (Second edition) : Proteolysis is an important part of many fundamental cellular processes. The intricate involvement of proteases and peptidases in protein quality control, general stress response, control of regulatory networks and development in Bacillus subtilis are introduced in this review. Especially the more recent developments on the role of AAA+ proteins and their adaptor proteins in regulated read more ...

Gene Regulation of Sporulation in Bacillus subtilis from Eduardo A. Robleto, Holly A. Martin, Amber M. Pepper and Mario Pedraza-Reyes writing in Bacterial Spores: Current Research and Applications : Endospore formation in the Bacilli has been used extensively as a proxy for cell growth and differentiation. Research that spans many years has revealed that endospore formation is a complex and elegant process that exquisitely coordinates the development of a dormant spore. The spore structure allows survival when nutrients and moisture are read more ...

Future Trends in RT-qPCR Technology and Their Implication in Applied Microbiology from Vijay J. Gadkar and Martin Filion writing in Quantitative Real-time PCR in Applied Microbiology : Real time-quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) technology has revolutionized the detection landscape in every area of molecular biology. The fundamental basis of this technology has remained unchanged since its inception, however various modifications have enhanced the overall performance of this highly versatile technology. These improvements have ranged from changes read more ...

Excerpt from a book review of Extremophiles: Microbiology and Biotechnology : "a solid and critical review of the impact that extremophiles have in biotechnology. It discusses the adaptation of thermophilic, psychrophilic, acidophilic, and radiation-resistant microorganisms in their respective habitats ... the book offers newcomers to the biotechnology industry a good overview and a simple introduction to the subject, above all on future trends and web sources. " from Sonja Albers (Marburg) writing in BIOspektrum (2012) 18: read more ...

The new book on Systems Microbiology edited by Brian D. Robertson and Brendan W. Wren will be available for dispatch within the next 2 or 3 read more ...

Functional metagenomics and systems biology: understanding the human organismal complexity in disease and health from Liping Zhao and Jian Shen writing in Metagenomics: Current Innovations and Future Trends : A devastating epidemic of chronic diseases is threatening the public health worldwide. Preventive healthcare systems require novel types of health assessment technologies which focus on the early warning biomarkers before the clinical onset of chronic diseases. In light of the systems theory, emergent functions of the human body should read more ...

Fruiting Body Development in Myxococcus xanthus : a Multicellular Developmental Program That Leads to Sporulation from Krista M. Giglio and Anthony G. Garza writing in Bacterial Spores: Current Research and Applications : The myxobacteria are Gram-negative spore formers. Although the spores of myxobacteria and those of Bacillus species, which are Gram-positive bacteria, have many properties in common, the developmental processes that lead to their formation are fundamentally different. In this chapter, we give a general overview of read more ...

from Wittwer CT and Farrar JS (2011) in PCR Troubleshooting and Optimization Real-time PCR requires monitoring the reaction during amplification. Fluorescence is a convenient method of interrogation that only requires a clear optical path for excitation and emission. Double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) dyes and fluorescently-labeled probes are both commonly used. dsDNA dyes directly measure the amount of double-stranded product produced. Probes used in real-time PCR function indirectly through fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET) or read more ...

from Theron et al. in Nanotechnology in Water Treatment Applications Flow cytometry (FC) detects and quantify light scattering from fluorescent-labeled cells that have crossed a laser beam. A single sample can be analysed within 3-5 min with a quantification limit of approximately 200 cells/ml. FC, although an optical detection method, is used in combination with molecular techniques. Bacterial cells in water have been monitored with flow cytometry through nucleic acid staining or targeting specific cells with antibodies or FISH read more ...