The bacterial dynamin-like protein DynA from Bacillus subtilis plays a key role in phage defense. It binds the plasma membrane through a unique paddle domain in its D1 subunit. This membrane associat...

The presence of tRNAs in bacteriophage genomes has intrigued scientists since their discovery in the early 1960s, as phages were believed to rely on the host tRNAs for their translation. Over the year...

As a leading research institution for microbial biotechnology the Institute of Bio- and Geosciences - Biotechnology (IBG-1, https://www.fz-juelich.de/de/ibg/ibg-1 ) at the Forschungszentrum Jülich foc...

npj Microgravity - Effects of extreme acceleration, microgravity, and deceleration on Bacillus subtilis onboard a suborbital space flight

Understanding bacterial gene function remains a major challenge. Double-mutant genetic interaction analysis addresses this challenge by uncovering the…

At the Faculty of Engineering and Science, Department of Chemistry and Bioscience, a 2.5 year position as Postdoc in “Identification and characterization of ...

In this Review, Schüler and colleagues summarize our current knowledge of magnetosome formation and organization within the cell, and they explore their function, diversity and potential applications.

Single-cell eukaryotic predators in the soil are a primary cause of bacterial cell death. Yet, most functional genomic studies on soil bacteria hav...

Many important biological functions arise not from single genes, but from complex interactions encoded by entire genomes. Genome language models have emerged as a promising strategy for designing biol...

By solving a previously unsolved biological question, the AI co-scientist predicted a complex mechanism of gene transfer and generated hypotheses that opened new research directions, illustrating AI's...

Cells regulate metabolic fluxes to balance energy production, biosynthesis, and the efficient use of limited resources, including the finite capacity for synthesizing and maintaining metabolic enzymes...

Vibrio parahaemolyticus (V. parahaemolyticus) poses significant threats to human health and aquaculture, yet the mechanisms linking QS to c-di-GMP signaling remain poorly understood. This work uncovers AphA as a pivotal regulator that directly activates eapA, an EAL domain phosphodiesterase (PDE), to elevate c-di-GMP levels at low cell density (LCD). We identify EapA as the LCD-specific PDE that degrades c-di-GMP and is directly activated by AphA. Deletion of eapA elevates c-di-GMP levels, enhancing biofilm formation while suppressing swimming motility; these phenotypes are epistatic to AphA. The discovery of the AphA-eapA-c-di-GMP axis provides novel insights into how QS integrates with second messengers to optimize bacterial fitness. This study underscores the complexity of c-di-GMP metabolism and highlights AphA’s dual role as a global transcriptional regulator, bridging gaps in our understanding of bacterial signaling networks.

Cyclic dimeric-GMP (c-di-GMP) is a ubiquitous bacterial second messenger that regulates a variety of cellular processes, including motility, biofil...

There is much less water on the surfaces of distant planets outside our solar system than previously thought. These exoplanets do not have thick layers of water, as was often speculated. That’s the co...

Author summary Biofilm formation enhances the environmental fitness of bacteria and relies on the second messenger c-di-GMP; the cellular levels of c-di-GMP are controlled by diguanylate cyclases (DGC...

A “σ cycle” in which the initiation factor σ associates with RNA polymerase (RNAP) core enzyme to permit transcription initiation and dissociates f...

The bacterium Listeria monocytogenes can grow in the cytoplasm of infected human cells, but there it relies on specific biosynthetic pathways for intracellular nutrient supply. We previously found tha...

Phenazines are highly prevalent, natural bioactive substances secreted by microbes. However, their mode of action and potential involvement in shaping microbiomes remain elusive. Here we performed a c...

Clostridioides difficile is an opportunistic pathogen for which better antibiotics are sorely needed. Most antibiotics target pathways that are essential for viability. Here, we use saturation transpo...

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Abstract. The ribosome-associated endoribonuclease 1 (Rae1) cleaves messenger RNAs (mRNAs) in a translation-dependent manner. Here, we identify a new Rae1