Fine-scale landscape heterogeneity drives microbial community structure at Robinson Ridge, East Antarctica.

Life at Robinson Ridge, located in the Windmill Islands region of East Antarctica, is susceptible to a changing climate. At this site, responses of the vegetation communities and moss-beds have been well researched, but corresponding information for microbial counterparts is still lacking. To bridge this knowledge gap, we established baseline data for monitoring the environmental drivers shaping the soil microbial community on the local 'hillslope' scale.

Effects of increasing soil moisture on Antarctic desert microbial ecosystems.

Overgeneralization and a lack of baseline data for microorganisms in high-latitude environments have restricted the understanding of the microbial response to climate change, which is needed to establish Antarctic conservation frameworks. To bridge this gap, we examined over 17,000 sequence variants of bacteria and microeukarya across the hyperarid Vestfold Hills and Windmill Islands regions of eastern Antarctica. Using an extended gradient forest model, we quantified multispecies response to variations along 79 edaphic gradients to explore the effects of change and wind-driven dispersal on community dynamics under projected warming trends.

Soil substrate culturing approaches recover diverse members of Actinomycetota from desert soils of Herring Island, East Antarctica.

Antimicrobial resistance is an escalating health crisis requiring urgent action. Most antimicrobials are natural products (NPs) sourced from Actinomycetota, particularly the Streptomyces. Underexplored and extreme environments are predicted to harbour novel microorganisms with the capacity to synthesise unique metabolites.

Lifting the veil on arid-to-hyperarid Antarctic soil microbiomes: a tale of two oases.

Background: Resident soil microbiota play key roles in sustaining the core ecosystem processes of terrestrial Antarctica, often involving unique taxa with novel functional traits. However, the full scope of biodiversity and the niche-neutral processes underlying these communities remain unclear. In this study, we combine multivariate analyses, co-occurrence networks and fitted species abundance distributions on an extensive set of bacterial, micro-eukaryote and archaeal amplicon sequencing data to unravel soil microbiome patterns of nine sites across two east Antarctic regions, the Vestfold Hills and Windmill Islands.

Communication within East Antarctic Soil Bacteria.

Antarctica, being the coldest, driest, and windiest continent on Earth, represents the most extreme environment in which a living organism can survive. Under constant exposure to harsh environmental threats, terrestrial Antarctica remains home to a great diversity of microorganisms, indicating that the soil bacteria must have adapted a range of survival strategies that require cell-to-cell communication. Survival strategies include secondary metabolite production, biofilm formation, bioluminescence, symbiosis, conjugation, sporulation, and motility, all of which are often regulated by quorum sensing (QS), a type of bacterial communication.

Megatrends in Infectious Diseases: The Next 10 to 15 Years.

It has been about 100 years since the Spanish influenza pandemic of 1918-19 that killed an estimated 50 million individuals globally. While we have made remarkable progress in reducing infection-related mortality, infections still account for 13 to 15 million deaths annually. This estimate is projected to remain unchanged until 2050.

Prevalence of Healthcare-Associated Infections and Antimicrobial Use Among Adult Inpatients in Singapore Acute-Care Hospitals: Results From the First National Point Prevalence Survey.

Background: We conducted a national point prevalence survey (PPS) to determine the prevalence of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) and antimicrobial use (AMU) in Singapore acute-care hospitals.

Methods: Trained personnel collected HAI, AMU, and baseline hospital- and patient-level data of adult inpatients from 13 private and public acute-care hospitals between July 2015 and February 2016, using the PPS methodology developed by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Factors independently associated with HAIs were determined using multivariable regression.

A new Haniffia species (Zingiberaceae) and a new generic record from Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo.

Background: Haniffia Holttum is a genus of three described species of terrestrial gingers hitherto restricted to Peninsular Thailand and various localities in Peninsular Malaysia.

Results: With generic placement confirmed using nrITS, trn K and mat K plastid sequence data, Haniffia santubongensis S.Y.

Role of pneumococcal vaccination in prevention of pneumococcal disease among adults in Singapore.

The burden of disease associated with Streptococcus pneumoniae infection in adults can be considerable but is largely preventable through routine vaccination. Although substantial progress has been made with the recent licensure of the new vaccines for prevention of pneumonia in adults, vaccine uptake rates need to be improved significantly to tackle adult pneumococcal disease effectively. Increased education regarding pneumococcal disease and improved vaccine availability may contribute to a reduction in pneumococcal disease through increased vaccination rates.

and (Araceae: Schismatoglottideae): A new example for the significance of pollen morphology in Araceae systematics.

Pollen characters in Araceae accord well with recent DNA-based phylogenies, and here we provide a new example of "compass needle" quality in Araceae on the basis of two closely related genera, and . All investigated pollen is psilate (smooth pollen surface) with calcium crystals covering the pollen surface. By contrast, pollen of species transferred to recently resurrected ( and ) is distinctively echinate (spiny).

Relationships within the Araceae: comparison of morphological patterns with molecular phylogenies.

Premise Of The Study: The first family-wide molecular phylogeny of the Araceae, a family of about 3800 published species in 120 genera, became available in 1995, followed by a cladistic analysis of morpho-anatomical data in 1997. The most recent and comprehensive family-wide molecular phylogeny was published in 2008 and included species from 102 genera. We reanalyzed the molecular data with a more complete genus sampling and compared the resulting phylogeny with morphological and anatomical data, with a view to contributing to a new formal classification of the Araceae.

Adult living donor liver transplantation in Singapore: the Asian centre for liver diseases and transplantation experience.

Introduction: Living donor liver transplantation (LDLT) has progressed dramatically in Asia due to the scarcity of cadaver donors and is increasingly performed in Singapore. The authors present their experience with adult LDLT.

Materials And Methods: Adult LDLTs performed at the Asian Centre for Liver Diseases and Transplantation, Singapore from 20 April 2002 until 20 March 2006 were reviewed.

Novel mutations within the embB gene in ethambutol-susceptible clinical isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

Genetic analysis of the embB gene revealed mutations in 17 (68%) of 25 ethambutol (EMB) resistant isolates (M306I, M306V, M306L, Q497R) but also in 4 (20%) of 20 EMB-susceptible isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, namely, an ATG-->ATM substitution resulting in M306I, G406N, and the novel alterations M423I and A659T.

Characterization of pyrazinamide and ofloxacin resistance among drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates from Singapore.

Objectives: To evaluate rapid molecular approaches for the detection of pyrazinamide (PZA) and ofloxacin resistance, by screening 100 known drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates.

Methods: Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates were tested for phenotypic resistance to pyrazinamide and ofloxacin using the BACTEC 460 radiometric method and the E-test, respectively. Mutation screening was done by amplifying the pncA, gyrA, and gyrB genes by the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and direct automated sequencing.