Adjuvant strategies to tackle -mediated polymyxin resistance.

The emergence of the () gene is a demonstrable threat contributing to the worldwide antibiotic resistance crisis. The gene is encoded on plasmids and can easily spread between different bacterial strains. encodes a phosphoethanolamine (pEtN) transferase, which catalyses the transfer of the pEtN moiety from phosphatidylethanolamine to lipid A, the head group of lipopolysaccharides (LPS).

A DFT study towards dynamic structures of iron and iron carbide and their effects on the activity of the Fischer-Tropsch process.

The Fe-based Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FTS) catalyst shows a rich phase chemistry under pre-treatment and FTS conditions. The exact structural composition of the active site, whether iron or iron carbide (FeC), is still controversial. Aiming to obtain an insight into the active sites and their role in affecting FTS activity, the swarm intelligence algorithm is implemented to search for the most stable Fe(100), Fe(110), Fe(210) surfaces with different carbon ratios.

Detecting polystyrene nanoplastics using filter paper-based surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy.

This work presents a novel filter paper-based method using surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS), for detecting polystyrene nanoplastics (PSNPs). The SERS system used a simple mixture of spherical Au nanoparticles (AuNPs) and 20 nm nanoplastics deposited onto a filter paper which offered a detection limit of 10 μg mL with a sample volume of 50 μL, and in a rare case 5.0 μg mL (with four aliquits of 50 μL).

A large chromosomal inversion shapes gene expression in seaweed flies ().

Inversions often underlie complex adaptive traits, but the genic targets inside them are largely unknown. Gene expression profiling provides a powerful way to link inversions with their phenotypic consequences. We examined the effects of the inversion in the seaweed fly on gene expression variation across sexes and life stages.

Discovery and biosynthesis of guanipiperazine from a NRPS-like pathway.

Nonribosomal peptide synthetases (NRPSs) are modular enzymes that use a thiotemplate mechanism to assemble the peptide backbones of structurally diverse and biologically active natural products in bacteria and fungi. Unlike these canonical multi-modular NRPSs, single-module NRPS-like enzymes, which lack the key condensation (C) domain, are rare in bacteria, and have been largely unexplored to date. Here, we report the discovery of a gene cluster () encoding a NRPS-like megasynthetase through genome mining.

Antimicrobial synergy of cationic grafted poly(-phenylene ethynylene) and poly(-phenylene vinylene) compounds with UV or metal ions against .

The rise in multidrug resistant bacteria is an area of growing concern and it is essential to identify new biocidal agents. Cationic grafted compounds were investigated for their antimicrobial properties using minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) tests. Synergy testing was carried out using the compounds in the presence of ultraviolet (UV).

: a new polychaete species (Annelida: Capitellidae) collected from a mangrove habitat on Ambon Island, Indonesia.

A new species Capitella ambonensis sp. nov. is described from loamy sand sediment of a mangrove habitat on Ambon Island, Indonesia.