This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Chitin is one of the most abundant sugars in the ocean. However, little is known about how the structure and diversity of chitin-degrading microbial communities vary across marine niches. Scientists have now shed light on the chitin processing potential within the microbiomes of marine sponges, octocorals, sediments, and seawater. Multiple cultivable genera were found to be able to degrade colloidal chitin in vitro. Genome analysis found that some non-cultivable species had genes needed to break down chitin, while other species had genes needed to utilize the chitin monomer N-acetylglucosamine. The researchers then analyzed the abundance of chitin-metabolism-related genes across 30 sequenced microbial metagenomes, and found data suggesting the ability of a marine sponge microbiome to convert chitin to its more biotechnologically versatile form - chitosan..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"The question of whether life exists outside our planet has captivated our attention for decades. In order to understand whether life could thrive in extraterrestrial environments, researchers turn to unique locations on Earth. Analogue sites – places resembling extraterrestrial environments – can help answer questions about what types of life could live in space. A recent project – Mars Analogues for Space Exploration (MASE) – examined microbes inhabiting representative space-like environments. Researchers isolated microbes from sites including permafrost, salt mines, acidic lakes and rivers, and sulfur springs and using metagenomics, they evaluated the proportions and characteristics of these unique microbes. They successfully identified 15 high-quality genomes, pinpointing specific microbial functions enriched in MASE sites. Compared to more moderate environments, MASE-residing microorganisms expressed genes that allowed them to withstand physical and chemical pressure..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Primary viral infections and reactivations are common complications after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT). Some allo-HSCT recipients develop graft-versus-host disease (GvHD) and must be highly immunosuppressed, making them more vulnerable to infection. In particular, weakly pathogenic or commensal viruses may cause illnesses in these patients yet remain undetected in the clinic. A new study sought to identify the viruses acquired by patients following allo-HSCT. Using metagenomics next-generation sequencing, they evaluated 25 adult allo-HSCT recipients from 2016 to 2019 with acute or chronic GvHD. During a period of immunosuppression with a median duration of 5.1 months, the GvHD mortality rate for these patients was 36%. Sequence analysis detected viral nucleotide sequences in 24 out of 25 patients, with ≥3 distinct viruses detected in 16 patients..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Viruses that infect bacteria and archaea are abundant in human and environmental microbiomes. Their roles in manipulating, killing, and recycling microbes makes them key players in environmental processes and human health and disease, including inflammatory bowel diseases. In spite of their importance, the tools available for analyzing viral genomes are limited. Now, a new tool allows researchers to identify viruses and predict their functions using genomic data. VIBRANT (Virus Identification By iteRative ANnoTation), is the first software to use a hybrid machine learning and protein similarity approach. going beyond traditional limitations to maximize the identification of highly diverse viruses. In validation experiments with reference datasets, VIBRANT recovered higher-quality virus sequences and reduced false identification of non-viral genome fragments compared to other identification programs..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Gut microbiome establishment during development is important for healthy host–microbiome symbiosis. Honeybees and bumblebees both have simple and host-specific gut microbiomes, but their colony cycles are very different. Honeybees and bumblebees both have simple and host-specific gut microbiomes, but their colony cycles are very different. While honeybee colonies persist for years, bumblebee colonies are newly established each year by solitary queens and unlike those in honeybee colonies, the mechanisms of microbiome development in bumblebee colonies remain unclear. To learn more, researchers recently used metagenomics to track microbiome changes in laboratory-raised bumblebees and their colonies over time. Some core microbes persisted throughout development and the gut microbiomes of newly emerged worker bees always resembled that of the queen, indicating vertical transmission from mother to offspring..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Interactions among probiotics, resident gut microbes and host factors affect probiotic engraftment and the resulting therapeutic effects. These interactions depend on gut-adaptive evolution of the probiotic strains, but the underlying processes—and their differences among host species—are unclear. In addition, the evolutionary effects of probiotics on native gut microbes are not well characterized. A recent genomics study examined the evolution and effects of the probiotic Lactiplantibacillus plantarum HNU082 (Lp082) in the human, mouse, and zebrafish gut. In all three species, Lp082 acquired single-nucleotide mutations. In vitro, the gut-adapted strains exhibited improved fitness related to carbohydrate utilization and acid tolerance and remained genetically stable for three months. In the human and mouse gut, Lp082 engraftment increased the numbers of mutations of the resident gut microbiota (GM) by 10- to 70-fold..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Termites are one of the few animal lineages able to digest the most abundant biomolecule on earth, lignocellulose. Of the nine families of termites, all but one of them eat wood, with the last feeding on soil. While termites produce enzymes that break down lignocellulose, their gut microbes are still a critical part of the digestion process. But most termite gut microbiome research to date is based on research from wood-feeding or pest species of termites. So, a recent study examined the prokaryotic gut microbes from a sample of termite species that better represent the diversity of termites. The gut microbes possessed a similar set of carbohydrate and nitrogen metabolism genes across the termite phylogenetic tree. The proportions of these genes varied with the hosts’ diet and position on the phylogenetic tree. Surprisingly, the soil-feeding termites didn't even have unique microbial metabolic genes or pathways compared to wood-feeding species..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Heavy use of antimicrobials can drive the accumulation of antimicrobial resistance genes in a microbiome, including the gut microbiomes of food-producing animals. Pigs are often given antimicrobials when dealing with porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS). While PRRS is caused by a virus, the secondary bacterial infections it leads to are managed with antimicrobials. A recent study investigated the impact of antimicrobials and PRRS infections on the resistome and microbiome of growing commercial pigs. The fecal resistome and microbiome of the young pigs showed a regular development trajectory, influenced primarily by weaning and aging. This trajectory was mostly unchanged by other factors like viral illness, antimicrobial exposure, or the physical grouping of pigs..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Antibiotic-resistant bacteria like carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) pose a serious threat to human health. Some resistant pathogens can exist alongside our commensal microbiota at undetectable levels. Antibiotic use can lead to outgrowth of these subclinically colonized bacteria. A recent study sought to better understand the interaction between the gut microbiota and CRE during subclinical colonization and outgrowth. First, researchers exposed wild-type mice to the CRE _K. pneumoniae_. While the levels of _K. pneumoniae_ were not detectable after exposure, the post-exposure microbiome was disrupted. Then, administration of an antibiotic cocktail, ampicillin, vancomycin, or azithromycin induced _K. pneumoniae_ outgrowth while reducing overall microbial diversity. Vancomycin only induced outgrowth in a subset of mice. The researchers found these outgrowth-susceptible mice had differences in mRNA stability pathways and xylose abundance..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Differential abundance analysis (DAA) is a key statistical method for comparing microbiome compositions under different conditions, such as health vs. disease. However, DAA is complicated by the use of relative, rather than absolute, abundance values and by a high risk of false positives, or detection of significant effects when there aren’t any. In addition, the existing DAA tools can produce very divergent results from the same data, making it difficult to select the best tool. To provide guidance, a new study comprehensively evaluated the currently available tools with simulations based on real data. The researchers found that none of the tools were simultaneously robust, powerful, and flexible. Therefore, they concluded that none were suitable for blind application to real microbiome datasets. To build a better path forward, the researchers designed a new tool, ZicoSeq that drew on the strengths of the other available DAA methods while addressing their major limitations..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Our gut microbes keep us healthy, regulating metabolism and immunity, but at the end of life, the gut microbiota is fragile, enhancing our susceptibility to diseases like C. difficile. One method of enhancing intestinal health is to incorporate prebiotics like galacto-oligosaccharides (GOS) into the diet. A recent study evaluated the impact of GOS diets on hallmarks of gut aging, including dysbiosis, inflammation and increased intestinal permeability. Using a mouse model, researchers found that older animals had increased ratios of bacteria that don’t process sugars (non-saccharolytic) to those that do (saccharolytic). GOS also reduced age-associated intestinal permeability and increased mucus thickness in older mice..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Rainforest rivers receive large amounts of terrestrially derived organic matter (TeOM) and carry it to the ocean, which plays a major role in linking terrestrial and marine ecosystems. Degradation of TeOM relies on river microbes capable of breaking down difficult-to-digest material. Unfortunately, many of the genes involved in this process are unknown. A recent study sought to better understand the genomic machinery of these microbes in one of the largest rivers in the world – the Amazon River. By analyzing 106 metagenomes from 30 sampling points along the river, researchers constructed the Amazon River basin Microbial non-redundant Gene Catalogue, or AMnrGC, including 3.7 million non-redundant genes, most of which belong to bacteria..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.