Background: Mosquitoes (Culicidae), as disease vectors, represent a risk for human health worldwide. Repeated introductions of alien mosquito species and the spread of invasive species have been recorded in different countries. Traditionally, identification of mosquitoes relies on morphological observation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFbacteria encompass noteworthy reproductive manipulators of their arthropod hosts. which influence host reproduction to favour their own transmission, also exploiting toxin-antitoxin systems. Recently, multiple other bacterial symbionts of arthropods have been shown to display comparable manipulative capabilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMigratory birds play an important role in transporting ixodid ticks and tick-borne pathogens between continents. During the Boreal spring, migratory birds reach Europe, mainly from sub-Saharan Africa or from northern African countries but not much is known about the diversity and ecology of the ticks they spread. From 2017 to 2022, in the framework of two consecutive projects focused on sampling migratory birds from Africa to Europe, a total of 27 immature Amblyomma ticks were collected from migratory birds, belonging to 8 species, captured on the Island of Ventotene, an important stop-over site in the Mediterranean Sea.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe zoonotic parasite is a global cause of gastrointestinal disease in humans and ruminants. Sequence analysis of the highly polymorphic gene enabled the classification of isolates into multiple groups (e.g.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe order Rickettsiales (Alphaproteobacteria) encompasses multiple diverse lineages of host-associated bacteria, including pathogens, reproductive manipulators, and mutualists. Here, in order to understand how intracellularity and host association originated in this order, and whether they are ancestral or convergently evolved characteristics, we built a large and phylogenetically-balanced dataset that includes de novo sequenced genomes and a selection of published genomic and metagenomic assemblies. We perform detailed functional reconstructions that clearly indicates "late" and parallel evolution of obligate host-association in different Rickettsiales lineages.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHolosporales are an alphaproteobacterial order engaging in obligate and complex associations with eukaryotes, in particular protists. The functional and evolutionary features of those interactions are still largely undisclosed. Here, we sequenced the genomes of two members of the species Bealeia paramacronuclearis (Holosporales, Holosporaceae) intracellularly associated with the ciliate protist Paramecium, which resulted in high correspondence.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt Microbiol
June 2024
Protists frequently host diverse bacterial symbionts, in particular those affiliated with the order Holosporales (Alphaproteobacteria). All characterised members of this bacterial lineage have been retrieved in obligate association with a wide range of eukaryotes, especially multiple protist lineages (e.g.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Health Polit Policy Law
February 2024
Context: A key task for countries around the world facing the COVID-19 pandemic was to achieve high vaccination coverage of the population. To overcome "vaccination inertia," governments adopted a variety of policy instruments. These instruments can be placed along a "ladder of intrusiveness" based on their degree of constraint of individual freedoms.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMidichloria spp. are intracellular bacterial symbionts of ticks. Representatives of this genus colonise mitochondria in the cells of their hosts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNematodes of the genus Dictyocaulus are the causative agents of parasitic bronchitis and pneumonia in several domestic and wild ungulates. Various species have been described in wild cervids, as the case of Dictyocaulus cervi in red deer, recently described as a separate species from Dictyocaulus eckerti. In Italy, information on dictyocaulosis in wildlife is limited and often outdated.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMultimorbid patients who enter English NHS hospitals are frequently subject to care pathways designed to assess, diagnose and treat single medical conditions. Opportunities are thereby lost to offer patients more holistic, person-centred care. Hospital organisations elsewhere are known to use in-hospital, multi-specialty, integrated clinical care (ICC) to overcome this problem.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF(Ciliophora) systematics is well studied, and about twenty morphological species have been described. The morphological species may include several genetic species. However, molecular phylogenetic analyses revealed that the species diversity within could be even higher and has raised a problem of cryptic species whose statuses remain uncertain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe genus Eustrongylides includes zoonotic nematodes that infect fish species and fish-eating birds of freshwater ecosystems. This study aimed to evaluate the occurrence of Eustrongylides in the paratenic host Perca fluviatilis (European perch) and in the definitive host, Phalacrocorax carbo sinensis (great cormorant), in Lake Annone, a shallow eutrophic lake located in the pre-mountainous area of the Alps in northwest Italy where wintering cormorants coexist with new breeding colonies. A total of 114 European perch and 48 cormorants were examined for the occurrence of Eustrongylides.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFContracaecum rudolphii (s.l.) is a complex of sibling species with different genetic structure and ecological preference.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHolosporales are an alphaproteobacterial lineage encompassing bacteria obligatorily associated with multiple diverse eukaryotes. For most representatives, little is known on the interactions with their hosts. In this study, we characterized a novel Holosporales symbiont of the ciliate Paramecium polycaryum.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe paper discusses the responses to the COVID-19 crisis in the acute phase of the first wave of the pandemic (February-May 2020) by different Italian regions in Italy, which has a decentralised healthcare system. We consider five regions (Lombardy, Veneto, Emilia-Romagna, Umbria, Apulia) which are located in the north, centre and south of Italy. These five regions differ both in their healthcare systems and in the extent to which they were hit by the first wave of COVID-19 pandemic.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe extraordinary global growth of digital connectivity has generated optimism that mobile technologies can help overcome infrastructural barriers to development, with 'mobile health' (mhealth) being a key component of this. However, while 'formal' (top-down) mhealth programmes continue to face challenges of scalability and sustainability, we know relatively little about how health-workers are using their own mobile phones in their work. Using data from Ghana, Ethiopia and Malawi, we document the reach, nature and perceived impacts of community health-workers' (CHWs') 'informal mhealth' practices, and ask how equitably these are distributed.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBacterial species able to produce proteins that are toxic against insects have been discovered at the beginning of the last century. However, up to date only two of them have been used as pesticides in mosquito control strategies targeting larval breeding sites: var. and .
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOn 31st January 2020, the Italian cabinet declared a 6-month national emergency after the detection of the first two COVID-19 positive cases in Rome, two Chinese tourists travelling from Wuhan. Between then and the total lockdown introduced on 22nd March 2020 Italy was hit by an unprecedented crisis. In addition to being the first European country to be heavily swept by the COVID-19 pandemic, Italy was the first to introduce stringent lockdown measures.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn many areas of Africa, recent studies highlighted the great impact of ticks on animal and human health throughout the continent. On the other hand, very limited information on the bacterial endosymbionts of the African ticks and their pattern of co-infections with other bacteria are found in literature, notwithstanding their pivotal role in tick survival and vector efficiency. Thus, we investigated the distribution of selected pathogenic and symbiotic bacteria in hard ticks collected from wild, domestic animals and from vegetation in various ecological zones in Africa and their co-occurrence in the same tick host.
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