Viruses are key players in diverse ecosystems, but studying their impacts is technically and taxonomically challenging. Taxonomic complexities derive from undersampling, diverse DNA and RNA genomes wi...

Bacteria with an intracellular lifestyle need to feed from inside their host cells. This study shows an adaptation of certain symbiotic bacteria, allowing them to actively retrieve nutrients from the host. High-pressure cryofixation has been combined with volume electron microscopy and in situ high spatial resolution chemical analysis. It reveals a complex bacterial membranous network that increases the exchange interface between the bacteria and host cytosol and maximizes carbohydrate acquisition.

By combining bioorthogonal non-canonical amino acid tagging, metaproteomics and stable isotope probing, we identified a rare and uncharacterized bacterium with a glycine-mediated metabolism for syntro...

Human host-associated cellular products may act as induction agents for bacteriophages.

Phages are typically viewed as very rapidly evolving biological entities. Little is known, however, about whether and how phages can establish long-term genetic stability. We addressed this eco-evolut...

In contrast to living organisms, viruses were long thought to lack protein synthesis machinery and instead depend on host factors to translate viral transcripts. Here, we discover that giant DNA virus...

Environmental stress drives biodiversity loss by altering competitive hierarchies and pushing taxa towards extinction. Parasites and their communities are particularly vulnerable to stress due to envi...

This Perspective discusses virus-encoded auxiliary metabolic genes and provides a framework for the biological interpretation of these genes.

The symbiotic agriculture of fungus-farming termites can collapse if they fail to prevent invading weeds. Previous studies suggest a role for symbiotic fungistatic microbes in bringing about weed cont...