Antibiotic resistance genes of public health importance in livestock and humans in an informal urban community in Nepal.

Efforts to mitigate the increasing emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) will benefit from a One Health perspective, as over half of animal antimicrobials are also considered medically important in humans, and AMR can be maintained in the environment. This is especially pertinent to low- and middle-income countries and in community settings, where an estimated 80% of all antibiotics are used. This study features AMR genes found among humans, animals, and water at an urban informal settlement in Nepal with intensifying livestock production.

Global shifts in mammalian population trends reveal key predictors of virus spillover risk.

Emerging infectious diseases in humans are frequently caused by pathogens originating from animal hosts, and zoonotic disease outbreaks present a major challenge to global health. To investigate drivers of virus spillover, we evaluated the number of viruses mammalian species have shared with humans. We discovered that the number of zoonotic viruses detected in mammalian species scales positively with global species abundance, suggesting that virus transmission risk has been highest from animal species that have increased in abundance and even expanded their range by adapting to human-dominated landscapes.

Optimizing Viral Discovery in Bats.

Viral discovery studies in bats have increased dramatically over the past decade, yet a rigorous synthesis of the published data is lacking. We extract and analyze data from 93 studies published between 2007-2013 to examine factors that increase success of viral discovery in bats, and specific trends and patterns of infection across host taxa and viral families. Over the study period, 248 novel viruses from 24 viral families have been described.