Viruses shape microbial community structure and activity through the control of population diversity and cell abundances. Identifying and monitoring the dynamics of specific virus-host pairs in nature is hampered by the limitations of culture-independent approaches such as metagenomics, which do not always provide strain-level resolution, and culture-based analyses, which eliminate the ecological background and in-situ interactions. Here, we have explored the interaction of a specific "autochthonous" host strain and its viruses within a natural community.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe demand for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) molecular diagnostics that are faster, cheaper, and simpler to run than nasopharyngeal-based reverse transcription quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) tests remains unmet in many parts of the world. In the Philippines, geographical and economic access to quality diagnostic testing remains out of reach for many communities. We describe the preclinical development of a fluorescence-based reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification test that uses drooled saliva as the biospecimen.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSalar de Uyuni (SdU) is the largest hypersaline salt flat and the highest lithium reservoir on Earth. In addition to extreme temperatures and high UV irradiance, SdU has high concentrations of chaotropic salts which can be important factors in controlling microbial diversity. Here, for the first time we characterize the viral diversity of this hypersaline environment during the two seasons, as well as the physicochemical characteristics and the prokaryotic communities of the analysed samples.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: The aim of this study is to assess the diagnostic value of the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in differentiating metastasic from non-metastatic lymph nodes in NSCLC patients compared with computed tomography (CT) and fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) - positron emission tomography (PET) or both combined.
Methods: Twenty-three studies (19 studies and 4 meta-analysis) with sample size ranging between 22 and 250 patients were included in this analysis. MRI, regardless of the sequence obtained, where used for the evaluation of N-staging of NSCLC.
Hypersaline environments close to saturation harbor the highest density of virus-like particles reported for aquatic systems as well as low microbial diversity. Thus, they offer unique settings for studying virus-host interactions in nature. However, no viruses have been isolated so far infecting the two most abundant inhabitants of these systems (that is, the euryarchaeon Haloquadratum walsbyi and the bacteroidetes Salinibacter ruber).
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