Wiep Klaas Smits (ExpBac/CMAT)

A short-acting psychedelic intervention for major depressive disorder: a phase IIa randomized placebo-controlled trial - Nature Medicine A single intravenous dose of the psychedelic dimethyltryptamine, combined with psychological support, produces rapid and lasting reductions in depressive symptoms in adults with major depressive disorder.

A single dose of the psychedelic drug dimethyltryptamine (DMT), given with psychological support, rapidly reduced depressive symptoms in 34 adults with major depressive disorder, according to a clinical trial published in Nature Medicine. 🧪#mentalhealthsci

New preprint: Identification of novel cellular intermediates unveils unique enzymes for flagellar glycan biosynthesis in Clostridioides difficile www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The CspC:CspA heterodimer transduces germinant and co-germinant signals during Clostridioides difficile spore germination Unlike other bacteria, C. difficile must detect both a germinant signal and a co-germinant signal to trigger spore germination, but how these cues are sensed is unknown. This study finds that the CspC...

The CspC:CspA heterodimer transduces germinant and co-germinant signals during Clostridioides difficile spore germination dx.plos.org/10.1371/jour...

#MicroSky

Excited that our article is out in
@cmijournal.bsky.social
this month: A roadmap to clinical translation of #microbiome research 🦠🧫
Check it out now: 10.1016/j.cmi.2026.01.021

Preprint on the permeability of Gram+ bacterial cell wall from a few months ago. Intriguing findings, elegant methodology. Cell wall is largely impermeable to molecule sizes of mNeonGreen (27kDa) and above. How do larger secreted proteins get through? www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #microsky

How do bacterial pangenomes evolve, what controls their dynamics, why do they exist?
Fitting a mechanistic model to 450 species from allthebacteria.org suggesting fast vs slow gene exchange (i.e. amount of MGEs) is a major differentiating factor, correlated with phylogeny rather than lifestyle

The emergence and biological characteristics of linezolid-resistant Clostridioides difficile isolates in the Asia-Pacific Region Linezolid-resistant Clostridioides difficile, conferred by the acquisition of cfr-like genes, has been reported in Europe and America. However, the emergence of linezolid resistance in C. difficile...

The emergence and biological characteristics of linezolid-resistant Clostridioides difficile isolates in the Asia-Pacific Region www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Phase 1 and preclinical studies reveal safety, pharmacokinetics, and efficacy of intranasal delivery of the influenza antibody CR9114 Intranasal CR9114 is safe in humans, and twice-daily dosing confers protection against influenza virus challenge in macaques.

Phase 1 and preclinical studies reveal safety, pharmacokinetics, and efficacy of intranasal delivery of the influenza antibody CR9114 | Science Translational Medicine www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Commensal human gut microbes produce species specific neuroactive compounds The gut microbiota communicates with multiple organs through neuroactive molecules, but the specific compounds produced remain unclear. We investigate…

Commensal human gut microbes produce species specific neuroactive compounds - www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

New Preprint 📢 from our team 🔎 Critical assessment of #intratumor and #low #biomass #microbiome using #longread sequencing

Some studies suggest bacteria 🦠 live inside tumors and influence cancer treatment. But there’s also been a major #debate: in these very​ low-microbe tissue samples, how much 1/

rince & JB Editor's Choice: Lin, Prince & Feaga identified sporulation genes via analyzing almost 1500 genomes. They show that that an unusual membrane-localized variant of Spo0B is found throughout Paenibacillaceae.
journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...
@asm.org #JBacteriology

BackToBack #PhageSky in @nature.com

A pore-forming antiphage defence is activated by oligomeric phage proteins
-from Maxwell & Norris
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Bacterial immune activation via supramolecular assembly with phage triggers
-from Laub & Ghanbarpour
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Parallel tracking by sequencing reveals the impact of restriction modification systems on transfer of an integrative and conjugative element www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Release v1.12 - Just do it, but don't crash · oschwengers/bakta This is the twelfth minor release (v1.12) providing more than 10 minor improvements and many bug fixes improving runtime stability, IO compatibility, and last but not least user experience. Compati...

🦠🧬🖥️ Bakta v1.12.0 is out

with tons of tiny improvements and bug fixes, too many to list all:

- partial genes on linear seqs
- improved errror handlings & runtimes
- support Python 3.12 & 3.13
- ...

A huge shout out and thank you to all bug reporters and contributors!

github.com/oschwengers/...

Ziplign published in JOSS. Tool to easily interactively compare two bacteria genomes. Inspired by ACT, but easier to install and use. Drag and drop files, or download using accessions. It runs blast for you. No terminal needed. github.com/martinghunt/...

Plasmids, a molecular cornerstone of antimicrobial resistance in the One Health era - Nature Reviews Microbiology In this Review, Castañeda-Barba, Top and Stalder use the One Health framework to synthesize the recent literature on the ecological and evolutionary factors that determine the successful local and glo...

Plasmids, a molecular cornerstone of antimicrobial resistance in the One Health era - www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Dynamic DnaA–DnaB interactions at oriC coordinate the loading and coupled translocation of two DnaB helicases for bidirectional replication Abstract. Bidirectional replication is a conserved principle requiring coordinated translocation of the two replicative helicases loaded at the origin. In

Dynamic DnaA–DnaB interactions at oriC coordinate the loading and coupled translocation of two DnaB helicases for bidirectional replication url: academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Wow. Journals like this should be immediately removed from the Clarivate database.

Sustained in situ protein production and release in the mammalian gut by an engineered bacteriophage - Nature Biotechnology Biologics are delivered to the gut using phage that infects resident commensal bacteria.

Sustained in situ protein production and release in the mammalian gut by an engineered bacteriophage www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Multiple protein structure alignment at scale with FoldMason Protein structure is conserved beyond sequence, making multiple structural alignment (MSTA) essential for analyzing distantly related proteins. Computational prediction methods have vastly extended ou...

FoldMason is out now in @science.org. It generates accurate multiple structure alignments for thousands of protein structures in seconds. Great work by Cameron L. M. Gilchrist and @milot.bsky.social.
📄 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
🌐 search.foldseek.com/foldmason
💾 github.com/steineggerla...

Global functional shifts in trees driven by alien naturalization and native extinction - Nature Plants This study finds that native tree extinctions and alien naturalizations are pushing forests towards fast-growing, resource-demanding species. This global shift could affect carbon storage and ecosyste...

Fast-growing trees are set to dominate the #forests of the #future — but at a cost🌳
Our Nature Plants (@natplants.nature.com) study shows a global shift toward "sprinter" tree species, while slow-growing, functionally critical #trees face elevated #extinction risk. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Large-scale capsid-mediated mobilisation of bacterial genomic DNA in the gut microbiome - www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Insights on Recurrent and Sequential Clostridioides difficile Infections From Genomic Surveillance in Minnesota, USA, 2019–2021 We used whole-genome sequencing to study Clostridioides difficile isolates from patients with recurrent or sequential infections in Minnesota, USA. We summ

Insights on Recurrent and Sequential Clostridioides difficile Infections From Genomic Surveillance in Minnesota, USA, 2019–2021 url: academic.oup.com/jid/article-...

Integration-coupled activation of promoterless combinatorial pathway libraries in Clostridium avoids burden during DNA assembly www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Awesome #aurora from our home balcony. Brightest I have seen in The Netherlands to date! (only one picture, straight from camera, no edits)

Fantastic new work from @bactophile.bsky.social @shailab.bsky.social et al from the Shen lab - Defining the order of assembly of the Clostridioides difficile divisome complex www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... #modelnotmodel

TlyA is a 23S and 16S 2′-O-methylcytidine methyltransferase important for ribosome assembly in Bacillus subtilis Abstract. Ribosomal RNA (rRNA) methylation is conserved across biology, yet the effect of rRNA methylation on ribosome function is poorly understood. In th

TlyA is a 23S and 16S 2′-O-methylcytidine methyltransferase important for ribosome assembly in Bacillus subtilis url: academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Bacteria sense the antibiotic rifampicin through a widespread dual-promoter based alarm system Abstract. Most antibiotics are natural compounds or their derivatives, and bacteria have evolved defensive mechanisms to resist them. Many of these mechani

Bacteria sense the antibiotic rifampicin through a widespread dual-promoter based alarm system url: academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

The E. coli clamp loader sharply bends DNA to load β-clamp onto small gaps www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...