oceany: Marine viruses

Evidence: 100 • authority: 72

Marine viruses are defined by their habitat as viruses that are found in marine environments, that is, in the saltwater of seas or oceans or the brackish water of coastal estuaries. Viruses are small infectious agents that can only replicate inside the living cells of a host organism, because they need the replication machinery of the host to do so. They can infect all types of life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. When not inside a cell or in the process of infecting a cell, viruses exist in the form of independent particles called virions. A virion contains a genome (a long molecule that carries genetic information in the form of either DNA…

Evidence: 75 • authority: 72

A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Viruses are found in almost every ecosystem on Earth and are the most numerous type of biological entity. Since the first discovery of a virus, the tobacco mosaic virus, in the 1890s, more than 16,000 of the millions of virus species have been described in detail. The study of viruses is known as virology, a subspeciality of microbiology. When infected, a host cell is often forced to rapidly produce thousands of copies of the original virus. When not inside an infected cell or in th…

Evidence: 49 • authority: 92

Living Microbial Drugs.. Living microbial therapeutics have arisen as a novel category of medications that extend beyond traditional small molecules and biologics. Advancements in synthetic biology have facilitated the rational engineering of microorganisms to detect host or disease-related signals and administer therapeutic chemicals in situ. In contrast to conventional pharmaceuticals, these live biotherapeutic agents engage in dynamic interactions with both the host and its microbiota, allowing context-specific, self-regulating therapies. This review emphasizes the progression of the field from conventional probiotics to advanced, designed living therapeutics. We examine principal microb…

Evidence: 49 • authority: 72

Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives (at least some of the time) on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. Parasites include single-celled protozoans such as the agents of malaria, sleeping sickness, and amoebic dysentery; animals such as hookworms, lice, mosquitoes, and vampire bats; fungi such as honey fungus and the agents of ringworm; and plants such as mistletoe, dodder, and the broomrapes. There are six major parasitic strategies of exploitation of animal hosts, namely parasitic castration, directly transmitted parasitism (by contact), trophically-transmitted pa…

Evidence: 49 • authority: 72

Marine microorganisms are defined by their habitat as microorganisms living in a marine environment, that is, in the saltwater of a sea or ocean or the brackish water of a coastal estuary. A microorganism (or microbe) is any microscopic living organism or virus, which is invisibly small to the unaided human eye without magnification. Microorganisms are very diverse. They can be single-celled or multicellular and include bacteria, archaea, viruses, and most protozoa, as well as some fungi, algae, and animals, such as rotifers and copepods. Many macroscopic animals and plants have microscopic juvenile stages. Some microbiologists also classify viruses as microorganisms, but others consider th…

Evidence: 43 • authority: 88

Arms Race between Enveloped Viruses and the Host ERAD Machinery. Enveloped viruses represent a significant category of pathogens that cause serious diseases in animals. These viruses express envelope glycoproteins that are singularly important during the infection of host cells by mediating fusion between the viral envelope and host cell membranes. Despite low homology at protein levels, three classes of viral fusion proteins have, as of yet, been identified based on structural similarities. Their incorporation into viral particles is dependent upon their proper sub-cellular localization after being expressed and folded properly in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). However, viral protein expr…

Evidence: 37 • authority: 80

Inside Job: Viruses Transfer cGAMP between Cells

Evidence: 37 • authority: 88

Lipid Accumulation in Host Cells Promotes SARS-CoV-2 Replication. Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) is still affecting the lives of people around the globe and remains a major public health threat. Lipid levels in the host cells have been shown to promote SARS-CoV-2 replication, and since the start of COVID-19 pandemic, several studies have linked obesity and other components of the metabolic syndrome with severity of illness, as well as mortality in patients with COVID-19. The aim of this study was to obtain insights into the pathophysiological mechanisms of these associations. First, we established an in vitro model simulating high fatty acid levels and showed that this situation induced…

Evidence: 37 • authority: 88

Cross-Regulation between Transposable Elements and Host DNA Replication. Transposable elements subvert host cellular functions to ensure their survival. Their interaction with the host DNA replication machinery indicates that selective pressures lead them to develop ancestral and convergent evolutionary adaptations aimed at conserved features of this fundamental process. These interactions can shape the co-evolution of the transposons and their hosts.

Evidence: 37 • authority: 92

Defence Warriors: Exploring the crosstalk between polyamines and oxidative stress during microbial pathogenesis.. Microbial infections have been a widely studied area of disease research since historical times, yet they are a cause of severe illness and deaths worldwide. Furthermore, infections by pathogens are not just restricted to humans; instead, a diverse range of hosts, including plants, livestock, marine organisms and fish, cause significant economic losses and pose threats to humans through their transmission in the food chain. It is now believed that both the pathogen and the host contribute to the outcomes of a disease pathology. Researchers have unravelled numerous aspects of hos…

Evidence: 37 • authority: 72

A genetically modified organism (GMO) is any organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. The exact definition of a genetically modified organism and what constitutes genetic engineering varies, with the most common being an organism altered in a way that "does not occur naturally by mating and/or natural recombination". A wide variety of organisms have been genetically modified (GM), including animals, plants, and microorganisms. Genetic modification can include the introduction of new genes or enhancing, altering, or knocking out endogenous genes. In some genetic modifications, genes are transferred within the same species, across species (creatin…