Multidrug-resistant pathogens causing nosocomial and community acquired infections delineate a significant threat to public health. It had urged to identify new antimicrobials and thus, generated interest in studying macrocyclic metal complex, which has been studied in the past for their antimicrobial activity. Hence, in the present study, we have evaluated the antimicrobial activity of the hexadentated macrocyclic complex of copper (II) (Cu Complex) derived from thiosemicarbazide against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. We observed increased susceptibility against standard isolates of Staphylococcus aureus with a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) range of 6.25 to 12.5 μg/mL. Similar activity was also observed towards methicillin resistant and sensitive clinical isolates of S. aureus from human (n = 20) and animal (n = 20) infections. The compound has rapid bactericidal activity, and we did not observe any resistant mutant of S. aureus. The compound also exhibited antibiofilm activity and was able to disrupt pre-formed biofilms. Cu complex showed increased susceptibility towards intracellular S. aureus and was able to reduce more than 95% of the bacterial load at 10 μg/mL. Overall, our results suggest that Cu complex with its potent anti-microbial and anti-biofilm activity can be used to treat MRSA infections and evaluated further clinically.

Agricultural nanotechnology has emerged in the late 1990s and is developed and applied all over the world. However, this technology has not developed so fast in different sectors of agriculture. This has not even found its market to the expected scale but has the potential to improve agricultural production. This agro nanotechnology can be utilized for developing healthy seeds that can improve plant germination, growth, yield, and quality. This technology has the potential to increase the storage period for vegetables and fruits. Organic pesticides and fertilizers can be developed by the proper use of agro nano technology. It has found it’s use in genetic engineering and plant breeding. However, the application of nanotechnology provides numerous advantages related to food safety and quality, at the same time it may present a potential risk not only to human health, but can affect animals and the environment as well as nanoparticles may have toxicological effects on biological systems.

No abstract

Agriculture is important for people all over the world in order to obtain food to sustain the ever-growing population. However, the current practices for obtaining more and more food has several environmental challenges. Hence, new environmentally friendly fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides have been developed that enhance crop yield by facilitating maximum nutrient uptake by the application of nanotechnology that will help in promoting sustainable agriculture by the slow or controlled release fertilizers. This slow discharge encourages improved delivery of nutrients to the plants that further speeds up early germination, fast growth, and high nutritional level. The current study is aimed to review nano-chemicals used in agriculture that have been developed by the researchers all over the world.

The trillions of microbes that colonize and live around us govern the health of both plants and animals through a cascade of direct and indirect mechanisms. Understanding of this enormous and largely untapped microbial diversity has been the focus of microbial research from the past few decades or so. Amidst the advancements in sequencing technologies, significant progress has been made to taxonomically and functionally catalogue these microbes and also to establish their exact role in the health and disease state. In comparison to the human microbiome, plants are also surrounded by a vast diversity of microbes that form complex ecological communities that affect plant growth and health through collective metabolic activities and interactions. This plant microbiome has a substantial influence on human health and environment via its passage through the nasal route and digestive tract and is responsible for changing our gut microbiome. This review primarily focused on the advances and challenges in microbiome research at the interface of plant and human, and role of microbiome at different compartments of the body’s ecosystems along with their correlation to health and diseases. This review also highlighted the potential therapies in modulating the gut microbiota and technologies for studying the microbiome.