About this Research Topic
It is evident today more than ever that the preservation of human life depends on balanced and equilibrated relationship with our planet. Nowadays diseases and multidrug resistant bacteria travel worldwide at the speed of an airliner through food supply, goods and travelers. Therefore, we believe that a holistic approach is needed.
The risks associated are exacerbated by a major inherent parameter of microorganisms, including pathogenic ones, which is the ability to form communities associated into biofilms. Sessile bacterial cells may have increased resistance to treatments and antimicrobials normally effective against planktonic cells.
In light of the recent advances in the study of microbiota, what is the impact of microbial communities on health and diseases?
Omic approach has now provided a tool to reveal unique microbial inhabitants of different niches that had never been described. As for example rare microbial taxa present in our food or guts or the spaces we live.
This Research Topic welcomes studies on:
- Mixed species microbial communities in the context of pharmaceutical, medical, veterinary, food and environmental microbiology, from a molecular point of view;
- Potential impact of mixed species microbial communities in our lives;
- Mixed species microbial biofilms, including viable but non-culturable (VBNC) microbes;
- Key aspects of mixed species microbial communities, emphasizing the application of ‘omics’ tools (metataxonomics, metagenomics, metatranscriptomics, metabolomics), as well as the combination with isotope-labeling techniques.
Our final goal is to unravelling diverse microniches that may affect, in a beneficial or detrimental way, global health, with a particular focus on the study of mixed species biofilms.
Descriptive studies that are solely based on amplicon (eg. 16S rRNA) profiles will not be considered, unless they are accompanied by a clear hypothesis and experimentation, providing insight into the microbiological system or process being studied.
The risks associated are exacerbated by a major inherent parameter of microorganisms, including pathogenic ones, which is the ability to form communities associated into biofilms. Sessile bacterial cells may have increased resistance to treatments and antimicrobials normally effective against planktonic cells.
In light of the recent advances in the study of microbiota, what is the impact of microbial communities on health and diseases?
Omic approach has now provided a tool to reveal unique microbial inhabitants of different niches that had never been described. As for example rare microbial taxa present in our food or guts or the spaces we live.
This Research Topic welcomes studies on:
- Mixed species microbial communities in the context of pharmaceutical, medical, veterinary, food and environmental microbiology, from a molecular point of view;
- Potential impact of mixed species microbial communities in our lives;
- Mixed species microbial biofilms, including viable but non-culturable (VBNC) microbes;
- Key aspects of mixed species microbial communities, emphasizing the application of ‘omics’ tools (metataxonomics, metagenomics, metatranscriptomics, metabolomics), as well as the combination with isotope-labeling techniques.
Our final goal is to unravelling diverse microniches that may affect, in a beneficial or detrimental way, global health, with a particular focus on the study of mixed species biofilms.
Descriptive studies that are solely based on amplicon (eg. 16S rRNA) profiles will not be considered, unless they are accompanied by a clear hypothesis and experimentation, providing insight into the microbiological system or process being studied.
Keywords: biofilms, one-health, omics, microniche, antimicrobials
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
