No abstract

Pathogenic Leptospira is the causative agent of leptospirosis, an emerging zoonotic disease affecting animals and humans worldwide. The risk of host infection following interaction with environmental sources depends on the ability of Leptospira to persist, survive, and infect the new host to continue the transmission chain. Leptospira may coexist with other pathogens, thus providing a suitable condition for the development of other pathogens, resulting in multi-pathogen infection in humans. Therefore, it is important to better understand the dynamics of transmission by these pathogens. We conducted Boolean searches of several databases, including Google Scholar, PubMed, SciELO, and ScienceDirect, to identify relevant published data on Leptospira and coinfection with other pathogenic bacteria. We review the role of the host-microbiota in determining the synanthropic interaction of Leptospira sp. with other bacteria, thus creating a suitable condition for the leptospira to survive and persist successfully. We also discuss the biotic and abiotic factors that amplify the viability of Leptospira in the environment. The coinfection of leptospira with pathogenic bacteria has rarely been reported, potentially contributing to a lack of awareness. Therefore, the occurrence of leptospirosis coinfection may complicate diagnosis, long-lasting examination, and mistreatment that could lead to mortality. Identifying the presence of leptospirosis with other bacteria through metagenomic analysis could reveal possible coinfection. In conclusion, the occurrence of leptospirosis with other diseases should be of concern and may depend on the success of the transmission and severity of individual infections. Medical practitioners may misdiagnose the presence of multiple infections and should be made aware of and receive adequate training on appropriate treatment for leptospirosis patients. Physicians could undertake a more targeted approach for leptospirosis diagnosis by considering other symptoms caused by the coinfected bacteria; thus, more specific treatment could be given.

Alzheimer's disease is a complex neurodegenerative disease and is only unique to human.The disease is defined in human brain by the accumulation of amyloid beta in the parenchyma of the brain. Withania somnifera, commonly known as Ashwagandha is an Indian Ayurvedic medicine that has been used for centuries to treat countless range of human health problem. The active compound of Ashwagandha was shown to be beneficial in treating many neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's disease (AD). In this study, Drosophila melanogaster AD model was used to study the effect of Ashwagandha on the toxicity of beta amyloid and also the longevity effect of the compound. We found that 20 mg/mL of Ashwagandha was shown to be effective in rescuing the "rough eye phenotype" of AD Drosophila. Furthermore, Ashwagandha also promotes longevity in AD as well as wildtype Drosophila. The results above showed that Ashwagandha could potentially be a potent drug to treat AD as well as maintaining the wellbeing of cells.

The Southern house mosquito, Culex quinquefasciatus (Cx. quinquefasciatus) is an important vector that transmit multiple diseases including West Nile encephalitis, Japanese encephalitis, St. Louis encephalitis and lymphatic filariasis. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) involve in many biological processes such development, infection, and virus-host interaction. However, there is no systematic identification and characterization of lncRNAs in Cx. quinquefasciatus. Here, we report the first ever lncRNA identification in Cx. quinquefasciatus. By using 31 public RNA-seq datasets, a total of 4,763 novel lncRNA transcripts were identified, of which 3,591, 569, and 603 were intergenic, intronic, and antisense respectively. Examination of genomic features revealed that Cx. quinquefasciatus shared similar characteristics with other species such as short in length, low GC content, low sequence conservation, and low coding potential. Furthermore, compared to protein-coding genes, Cx. quinquefasciatus lncRNAs had lower expression values, and tended to be expressed in temporallyspecific fashion. In addition, weighted correlation network and functional annotation analyses showed that lncRNAs may have roles in blood meal acquisition of adult female Cx. quinquefasciatus mosquitoes. This study presents the first systematic identification and analysis of Cx. quinquefasciatus lncRNAs and their association with blood feeding. Results generated from this study will facilitate future investigation on the function of Cx. quinquefasciatus lncRNAs..

Here, we report the complete genome sequence of Paenibacillus durus type strain ATCC 35681, which can fix atmospheric nitrogen even in the presence of nitrate.