The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
Setting an example, the Arunachal Pradesh Environment and Forest Department has achieved 70 per cent afforestation in the state at a time when forest areas are decreasing alarmingly in the country. The afforestation programme was undertaken under the State Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority in 2010 in the …
Nitrous oxide (N2O) is the predominant ozone-depleting substance and contributes approximately 6% to overall global warming. Terrestrial ecosystems account for nearly 70% of total global N2O atmospheric loading, of which at least 45% can be attributed to microbial cycling of nitrogen in agriculture. The reduction of N2O to nitrogen gas …
Itanagar: Setting an example, the Arunachal Pradesh Environment and Forest Department has achieved 70 per cent afforestation in the state at a time when forest areas are decreasing alarmingly in the country. The afforestation programme was undertaken under the State Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority in 2010 in …
Liquid water has been known to occur beneath the Antarctic ice sheet for more than 40 years, but only recently have these subglacial aqueous environments been recognized as microbial ecosystems that may influence biogeochemical transformations on a global scale. Here we present the first geomicrobiological description of water and surficial …
Acquisition of the intestinal microbiota begins at birth, and a stable microbial community develops from a succession of key organisms. Disruption of the microbiota during maturation by low-dose antibiotic exposure can alter host metabolism and adiposity. We now show that low-dose penicillin (LDP), delivered from birth, induces metabolic alterations and …
Streptococcus pneumoniae is carried asymptomatically in the nasopharyngeal tract. However, it is capable of causing multiple diseases, including pneumonia, bacteraemia and meningitis, which are common causes of morbidity and mortality in young children. Antibiotic treatment has become more difficult, especially that involving the group of beta-lactam antibiotics where resistance has …
Metabolic disorders, including obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, are widespread in Westernized nations. Gut microbiota composition is a contributing factor to the susceptibility of an individual to the development of these disorders; therefore, altering a person’s microbiota may ameliorate disease. One potential microbiome-altering strategy is the incorporation of modified bacteria …
Vertebrates harbour diverse communities of symbiotic gut microbes. Host diet is known to alter microbiota composition, implying that dietary treatments might alleviate diseases arising from altered microbial composition (‘dysbiosis’). However, it remains unclear whether diet effects are general or depend on host genotype. Here we show that gut microbiota composition …
Case in the United States Court of Appeals regarding approval for use of penicillin and tetracyclines in animal feed, 24/07/2014. Read More: Appeals court decision on NRDC’s lawsuit against FDA for failing to address antibiotic overuse in livestock production
Microorganisms and their viruses are increasingly recognized as drivers of myriad ecosystem processes. However, our knowledge of their roles is limited by the inability of culture-dependent and culture-independent (e.g., metagenomics) methods to be fully implemented at scales relevant to the diversity found in nature. Here we combine advances in bioinformatics …
An expert panel was convened in October 2013 by the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics (ISAPP) to discuss the field of probiotics. It is now 13 years since the definition of probiotics and 12 years after guidelines were published for regulators, scientists and industry by the Food and …
Infectious diseases caused by food-borne parasites have not received the same level of attention as other food-borne biological and chemical hazards. Nevertheless, they cause a high burden of disease in humans, may have prolonged, severe, and sometimes fatal outcomes, and result in considerable hardship in terms of food safety, security, …
Therapeutic food interventions have reduced mortality in children with severe acute malnutrition (SAM), but incomplete restoration of healthy growth remains a major problem. The relationships between the type of nutritional intervention, the gut microbiota, and therapeutic responses are unclear. In the current study, bacterial species whose proportional representation define a …
Over the past two decades Denmark has instituted reforms to antibiotic use for livestock that are showing solid progress in reducing the prevalence of resistant bacteria. Original Source
Emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in the animal reservoir forms a risk for human health. The use of antimicrobials in animals is the major cause of development of AMR in bacteria in animals. In the 1990s, the use of antimicrobials in animals, particularly as a growth promoter, led to alarming …
A primary goal of the Human Microbiome Project (HMP) was to provide a reference collection of 16S ribosomal RNA gene sequences collected from sites across the human body that would allow microbiologists to better associate changes in the microbiome with changes in health. The HMP Consortium has reported the structure …
Scientists are struggling to find the cause of a disease that is killing off numerous species of starfish on both the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of North America, dispatching the five-armed creatures in a particularly gruesome way. Researchers said on Thursday they have ruled out some possible culprits including fungi, …
The primary objective was to estimate the burden of invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) in children aged 1 month to 12 years in South Asian countries. Original Source
Mine drainage is an important environmental disturbance that affects the chemical and biological components in natural resources. However, little is known about the effects of neutral mine drainage on the soil bacteria community. Here, a high-throughput 16S rDNA pyrosequencing approach was used to evaluate differences in composition, structure, and diversity …
