食品微生物安全成为我国重要研究领域

随着我国社会的发展,人们对食品的质量有了越来越高地要求,对食品对于健康的影响也有了更深入的认识。与此同时,国内科技工作者对食品微生物及其安全性研究给予了相当重视,仅就2010年本刊发表的研究论文数量来看,虽然"环境微生物"栏目有25篇(不包括"环境微生物专刊"),但"食品微生物"栏目论文数量也相当可观,共发表了17篇论文。在相关工作中,有关食品安全方面的论文有7篇,其研究工作取得了     

微生物生产天然色素的研究进展

综述了天然色素在微生物的新资源、培养条件、发酵工艺及基因工程菌等方面的研究进展,展望了天然色素的开发和应用的未来发展方向。     

国内同行对水环境相关微生物的研究给予了重视

<正>根据《微生物学通报》2009年发表文章的统计分析,与环境微生物相关的研究工作成为该年度刊发论文的重要主体。尽管第4期"环境微生物专刊"集中发表了国内环境微生物同行的一些工作,但是在全年所出     

微生态系统和微生态制剂的研究进展

阐述了微生态系统和微生态制剂的定义;概述了口腔、咽部、及胃肠道微生态系统的研究现状和发展方向;概述了胃肠道内微生物群的种类、相互作用机制,以及针对胃肠道微生态系统应运而生的微生态制剂的作用原理和种类。并对未来微生态系统的发展和应用领域做出了展望。     

Evidence for Microbial Involvement in Pool Finger Precipitation,Hidden Cave,New Mexico

Although speleothems are usually considered inorganic precipitates, recent work has demonstrated hitherto unsuspected biogenic influence in some twilight areas. We have expanded this notion to the dark zone, examining pool fingers from Hidden Cave, New Mexico, to test for possible bacterial involvement. The pool fingers in Hidden Cave are pendant speleothems that formed subaqueously in paleo-pools. They are 1 to 4 cm in diameter and 5 to 50 cm long. A knobby, irregular external shape is underlaid by a layered interior on two scales, a 0.5 to 1.0 cm alternation between dense and porous layers and a mm-scale alternation between dark micritic calcite and clear dogtooth spar. The micrite is similar to microbialites identified in modern and ancient carbonates. Fossil bacteria were found in all layers. These include (1) calcified filaments 1 w m in diameter and 5–50 w m long and (2) micro-rods 0.1 w m by 1–2 w m. Most filaments are curved rods with a smooth surface but rare examples display a diamond crosshatch surface. The micro-rods occur as isolated crystals to dense meshes. We interpret the micro-rods as calcified bacilliform bacteria and the filaments as calcified filamentous bacteria. Carbon isotopic data are slightly more negative (by - 0.5 to - 1.0% in micritic layers than in dogtooth spar layers, suggesting a greater microbial influence in the micritic layers. Based on these similarities to known microbialites (e.g., petrographic fabrics, the presence of fossil bacteria, and the suggestive carbon isotopic data), we conclude that microbial activity was an intimate part of pool finger formation in Hidden Cave. The significance of such involvement goes beyond speleological contexts to wider questions of identification of biosignatures in rocks on earth and beyond.     

BASIN: A Semi-automatic Workflow,with Machine Learning Segmentation,for Objective Statistical Analysis of Biomedical and Biofilm Image Datasets

Micrograph comparison remains useful in bioscience. This technology provides researchers with a quick snapshot of experimental conditions. But sometimes a two- condition comparison relies on researchers’ eyes to draw conclusions. Our Bioimage Analysis, Statistic, and Comparison (BASIN) software provides an objective and reproducible comparison leveraging inferential statistics to bridge image data with other modalities. Users have access to machine learning-based object segmentation. BASIN provides several data points such as images’ object counts, intensities, and areas. Hypothesis testing may also be performed. To improve BASIN’s accessibility, we implemented it using R Shiny and provided both an online and offline version. We used BASIN to process 498 image pairs involving five bioscience topics. Our framework supported either direct claims or extrapolations 57% of the time. Analysis results were manually curated to determine BASIN’s accuracy which was shown to be 78%. Additionally, each BASIN version’s initial release shows an average 82% FAIR compliance score.     

The immune system as key to cancer treatment: Triggering its activity with microbial agents

Traditional methods such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy offer only limited success in treating cancer. Part of the reason is related to our misunderstanding of what cancer is: it is not the cause but the consequence of a weakened living system. Localized cellular stress, caused by toxins, mutagens or radiation, coupled with a weakened systemic response or inability to support or defend the cells that are under attack, cause these cells to revert to an ancient, unicellular mode of survival, therefore cutting links with the overarching organism and defend themselves from the threat as if they were individual entities. We hypothesize that strengthening the organism, specifically the immune system, is a more promising approach toward a cure for cancer than attempting to exterminate cancer cells. The hypothesis can be tested by experiments that are designed to strengthen the immune system by both traditional means (e.g., ingestion of natural substances known to increase the activity of the immune system, such as fruits, vegetables, and nuts), diminish immune system inhibitors released by cancer cells (e.g., TGF-β), and by the injection of heat-killed or genetically altered pathogenic bacteria to trigger a massive response (fever response) of the immune system into the affected area and compare those results to traditionally used methods.     

百里杜鹃保护区马缨杜鹃土壤真菌群落特征

近年来,贵州百里杜鹃保护区戛木管理区发现有部分马缨杜鹃感染根腐病,造成其大量死亡,致病机制尚不明确。为了研究马缨杜鹃根腐病发病区土壤真菌群落结构组成,探讨真菌微生物种类组成变化与根腐病发病的关联,以感病马缨杜鹃根部土壤和未感病马缨杜鹃根部土壤的土壤为对象,利用高通量测序技术进行测序,发现2份感病杜鹃根部土壤中分别有846和911个操作分类单元(operating taxonomic unit, OTUs),而未感病杜鹃根部土壤仅有439个OTUs。通过分析土壤真菌物种丰度和分类、α-多样性、β-多样性、主成分(principal component analysis, PCA)分析和聚类分析。结果表明:感病马缨杜鹃和未感病马缨杜鹃根部土壤真菌多样性和群落结构存在较大差异,未感病杜鹃根部土壤的真菌微生物种类明显少于感病杜鹃根部土壤。