, January 28, 2026
Regulation of extracellular vesicles for protein secretion in <i>Aspergillus nidulans</i>

Regulation of extracellular vesicles for protein secretion in Aspergillus nidulans

Rebekkah E. Pope1, Patrick Ballmann2, Lisa Whitworth3 and Rolf A. Prade1,*

This study reveals that Aspergillus nidulans boosts extracellular vesicle production when ER-trafficked enzymes are induced, uncovering how fungi remodel their secretome through vesicle-mediated secretion to adapt to changing environments and biofilm formation.

January 23, 2026
Transcriptomic response to different heme sources in <i>Trypanosoma cruzi</i> epimastigotes

Transcriptomic response to different heme sources in Trypanosoma cruzi epimastigotes

Evelyn Tevere1,a, María G. Mediavilla1,a, Cecilia B. Di Capua1, Marcelo L. Merli1, Carlos Robello2,3, Luisa Berná2,4 and Julia A. Cricco

This study uncovers how the Chagas disease parasite adapts to changes in heme, an essential molecule for its survival, providing transcriptional clues to heme metabolism and identifying a previously unreported heme-binding protein in T. cruzi.

, January 21, 2026

Sir2 regulates selective autophagy in stationary-phase yeast cells

Ji-In Ryua, Juhye Junga, and Jeong-Yoon Kim

This study establishes Sir2 as a previously unrecognized regulator of selective autophagy during the stationary phase and highlight how cells dynamically control organelle degradation.

, February 5, 2020

Stable and destabilized GFP reporters to monitor calcineurin activity in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Jutta Diessl1, Arpita Nandy1, Christina Schug1, Lukas Habernig1 and Sabrina Büttner1,2

This study introduces GFP-based transcriptional reporters driven by a calcineurin-dependent response element, enabling real-time monitoring of calcineurin activity in live yeast cells for studying stress responses, aging, and antifungal drug screening.

, January 3, 2020

The euchromatic histone mark H3K36me3 preserves heterochromatin through sequestration of an acetyltransferase complex in fission yeast

Paula R. Georgescu1, Matías Capella1, Sabine Fischer-Burkart1 and Sigurd Braun1

This study reveals that the loss of heterochromatin silencing in Set2-deficient cells is due to unrestrained Mst2C activity, highlighting the need for spatially restricted chromatin-modifying enzymes to maintain distinct chromatin states.

, December 3, 2019

Depletion of SNAP-23 and Syntaxin 4 alters lipid droplet homeostasis during Chlamydia infection

Tiago Monteiro-Brás1,2,3, Jordan Wesolowski1 and Fabienne Paumet1

This study reveals that the plasma membrane SNARE proteins SNAP-23 and Syntaxin 4 are crucial for Chlamydia trachomatis development by regulating lipid droplet homeostasis and supporting the formation of infectious progeny within host cells.

, November 19, 2019

Yeast can express and assemble bacterial secretins in the mitochondrial outer membrane

Janani Natarajan1, Anasuya Moitra1, Sussanne Zabel1,§, Nidhi Singh2, Samuel Wagner2,3 and Doron Rapaport1

Secretins, essential components of bacterial secretion systems, can be expressed in yeast and show differential dependencies on mitochondrial import and assembly factors for membrane integration, suggesting diverse pathways for their assembly into the bacterial outer membrane.

, November 14, 2019

Metabolic reprogramming of Salmonella infected macrophages and its modulation by iron availability and the mTOR pathway

Julia Telser1,2,#, Chiara Volani1,3,#, Richard Hilbe1,2, Markus Seifert1,2, Natascha Brigo1, Giuseppe Paglia4 and Günter Weiss1,2

This article shows that iron plays a critical role in both the immune response and metabolic reprogramming of macrophages during infection, influencing the TCA cycle and mTOR pathway, with implications for the growth of intracellular bacteria like Salmonella.

, October 7, 2019

Type II-Metacaspases are involved in cell stress but not in cell death in the unicellular green alga Dunaliella tertiolecta

M. Teresa Mata1,&, Armando Palma1, Candela García-Gómez1,#, María López-Parages1, Víctor Vázquez1, Iván Cheng-Sánchez2, Francisco Sarabia2, Félix López-Figueroa1, Carlos Jiménez1 and María Segovia1

This article shows that in the green alga Dunaliella tertiolecta, Type-II metacaspases are involved in the stress response to ultraviolet radiation but are not linked to cell death, suggesting their role in survival strategies under stressful environmental conditions.

, September 30, 2019

Transcriptomic and chemogenomic analyses unveil the essential role of Com2-regulon in response and tolerance of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to stress induced by sulfur dioxide

Patrícia Lage1,2, Belém Sampaio-Marques3,4, Paula Ludovico3,4, Nuno P. Mira5 and Ana Mendes-Ferreira1,2

This article shows that in the presence of sulfur dioxide (SO2), the transcription factor Com2 plays a critical role in the tolerance and response of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, affecting the expression of a majority of SO2-activated genes and contributing to the protection against stress induced by SO2 at an enologically relevant pH.

, September 24, 2019

Proline metabolism regulates replicative lifespan in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Yukio Mukai1, Yuka Kamei1, Xu Liu1, Shan Jiang1, Yukiko Sugimoto2, Noreen Suliani binti Mat Nanyan2, Daisuke Watanabe2 and Hiroshi Takagi2

This article shows that intracellular proline levels in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae are correlated with its replicative lifespan, suggesting a protective role of proline against cellular senescence due to various stresses.

, July 9, 2019

Network dynamics of the yeast methyltransferome

Guri Giaever1, Elena Lissina1 and Corey Nislow1

This article presents a systematic genetic analysis of methyltransferases (MTases) under normal and stress conditions, uncovering the complex and adaptive nature of the methyltransferome and discovering a potential connection between phospholipid methylation and histone methylation, suggesting interplay between lipid homeostasis and epigenetic regulation.

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, June 22, 2017

Impact of the host on Toxoplasma stage differentiation

Carsten G.K. Lüder1 and Taibur Rahman1

This review summarizes how Toxoplasma gondii transitions from an acute to a chronic infection in warm-blooded animals and humans through a developmental switch influenced by host cell physiology, which determines parasite persistence mainly in neural and muscular tissues.

, June 14, 2017

Chlamydia and mitochondria – an unfragmented relationship

Suvagata Roy Chowdhury1 and Thomas Rudel1

This article comments on work published by Chowdhury et al (J Cell Biol, 2017), which demonstrated that Chlamydia infection induces and requires an upregulation of the host miRNA, miR-30c-5p (miR-30c) to ameliorate infection induced stress on the host mitochondrial architecture and hinders induction of apoptosis.

, May 29, 2017

Protein aggregation triggers a declining libido in elder yeasts that still have a lust for life

Fabrice Caudron

This article comments on work published by Schlissel et al (Science 2017), showing that aging in yeast does not lead to the expected loss of heterochromatin silencing due to Sir2 inactivity, but rather to reduced mating pheromone sensitivity caused by the aggregation of the RNA-binding protein Whi3, which can be reversed by eliminating Whi3’s polyglutamine domain.

, May 1, 2017

Post-transcriptional regulation of ribosome biogenesis in yeast

Isabelle C. Kos-Braun and Martin Koš

Microorganisms adapt to environmental changes by regulating their metabolism, and one key survival strategy is to decrease energy use during adverse conditions by halting ribosome production, with recent findings showing yeast can switch between pre-rRNA processing pathways in response to environmental shifts, adding complexity to ribosome biogenesis regulation.

, April 27, 2017

Placeholder factors in ribosome biogenesis: please, pave my way

Francisco J. Espinar-Marchena, Reyes Babiano1 and Jesús de la Cruz

In ribosome synthesis, “placeholder” factors are crucial trans-acting elements that regulate the timing and assembly of ribosomal proteins, ensuring speed and accuracy in this intricate process by preventing premature interactions and guiding the proper formation of functional ribosomal subunits.

, April 25, 2017

Insights from the redefinition of Helicobacter pylori lipopolysaccharide O-antigen and core-oligosaccharide domains

Hong Li1,2, Tiandi Yang3, Tingting Liao2, Aleksandra W. Debowski2,4, Hans-Olof Nilsson2, Stuart M. Haslam3, Anne Dell3, Keith A. Stubbs4, Barry J. Marshall2 and Mohammed Benghezal2,5

This article comments on work published by Li et al. (PloS Pathog, 2017), focusing on Helicobacter pylori infections. They are mostly asymptomatic but can lead to serious conditions, and H. pylori lipopolysaccharide (LPS) is crucial for colonization and persistence, making the study of its structure and biosynthesis pathway vital for understanding pathogenesis and developing treatments.

, March 17, 2017

Evading plant immunity: feedback control of the T3SS in Pseudomonas syringae

Christopher Waite1, Jörg Schumacher1, Milija Jovanovic1, Mark Bennett1 and Martin Buck1

This article comments on work published by Waite et al. (mBio, 2017), which indicates that a negative autogenous control mechanism, where the sigma factor HrpL represses its own expression, permits the plant pathogen Pseudomonas syringae to fine-tune its type III secretion system, potentially reducing the elicitation of plant immunity and enhancing its ability to cause disease.

, March 16, 2017

Microbial flora, probiotics, Bacillus subtilis and the search for a long and healthy human longevity

Facundo Rodriguez Ayala, Carlos Bauman, Sebastián Cogliati, Cecilia Leñini, Marco Bartolini and Roberto Grau

This article comments on work published by Donato et al. (Nat Commun, 2017), which reveals that the probiotic Bacillus subtilis extends the lifespan of Caenorhabditis elegans via mechanisms including the formation of biofilms and the production of signaling molecules like NO and CSF, suggesting a potential pathway through insulin-like signaling that could impact human longevity and age-related diseases.

, March 2, 2017

Chlamydia trachomatis’ struggle to keep its host alive

Barbara S. Sixt1-4, Raphael H. Valdivia5, Guido Kroemer1-4,6-7

This article comments on work published by Sixt et al. (Cell Host Microbe, 2016), which analyzed a CpoS-deficient mutant yielding unique insights into the nature of cell-autonomous defense responses against Chlamydia.

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, August 1, 2016

Similar environments but diverse fates: Responses of budding yeast to nutrient deprivation.

Saul M. Honigberg

Diploid budding yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) can adopt one of several alternative differentiation fates in response to nutrient limitation, and each of these fates provides distinct biological functions. When different strain backgrounds are taken into account, these various fates occur in response to similar environmental cues, are regulated by the same signal transduction pathways, and share many of the same master regulators. I propose that the relationships between fate choice, environmental cues and signaling pathways are not Boolean, but involve graded levels of signals, pathway activation and master-regulator activity.

, May 1, 2016

Phosphatidylthreonine: An exclusive phospholipid regulating calcium homeostasis and virulence in a parasitic protist

Ruben D. Arroyo-Olarte and Nishith Gupta

This article comments on work published by Kuchipudi et al. (Microbial Cell, 2016), which describes the role of phohsphatidylthreonine in the regulation of calcium homeostasis and virulence in the protozoan parasite Toxoplasma gondii.

, April 13, 2016

Non-genetic impact factors on chronological lifespan and stress resistance of baker’s yeast

Michael Sauer and Diethard Mattanovich

This article comments on work published by Bisschops et al. (Microbial Cell, 2015), which illustrates how important the choice of the experimental setup is and how culture conditions influcence cellular aging and survival in biotechnological processes.

, April 4, 2016

What’s old is new again: yeast mutant screens in the era of pooled segregant analysis by genome sequencing

Chris Curtin and Toni Cordente

This article comments on work published by Den Abt et al. (Microbial Cell, 2016), which identified genes involved in ethyl acetate formation in a yeast mutant screen based on a new approach combining repeated rounds of chemical mutagenesis and pooled segregant analysis by whole genome sequencing.

, March 17, 2016

The complexities of bacterial-fungal interactions in the mammalian gastrointestinal tract

Eduardo Lopez-Medina1 and Andrew Y. Koh2

This article comments on work published by Lopez-Medina et al. (PLoS Pathog, 2015) and Fan et al. (Nat Med, 2015), which utilize an “artificial” niche, the antibiotic-treated gut with concomitant pathogenic microbe expansion, to gain insight in bacterial-fungal interactions in clinically common scenarios.

, March 6, 2016

Gearing up for survival – HSP-containing granules accumulate in quiescent cells and promote survival

Ruofan Yu and Weiwei Dang

This article comments on work published by Lee et al. (Microbial Cell, 2016), which reports that distinct granules are formed in quiescent and non-quiescent cells, which determines their respective cell fates.

, March 3, 2016

Yeast screening platform identifies FDA-approved drugs that reduce Aβ oligomerization

Triana Amen1,2 and Daniel Kaganovich1

This article comments on work published by Park et al. (Microbial Cell, 2016), which discovered a number of small molecules capable of modulating Aβ aggregation in a yeast model.

November 26, 2015

Groupthink: chromosomal clustering during transcriptional memory

Kevin A. Morano

In this article, the authors comment on the study “NO1 transcriptional memory leads to DNA zip code-dependent interchromosomal clustering.” by Brickner et al. (Microbial Cell, 2015), discussing the importance and molecular mechanisms of chromosomal clustering during transcriptional memory.

November 26, 2015

Yeast proteinopathy models: a robust tool for deciphering the basis of neurodegeneration

Amit Shrestha1, 2 and Lynn A. Megeney1, 2, 3

Protein quality control or proteostasis is an essential determinant of basic cell health and aging. Eukaryotic cells have evolved a number of proteostatic mechanisms to ensure that proteins retain functional conformation, or are rapidly degraded when proteins misfold or self-aggregate. This article discusses the use of budding yeast as a robust proxy to study the intersection between proteostasis and neurodegenerative disease.

Microbial Cell

is an open-access, peer-reviewed journal that publishes exceptionally relevant research works that implement the use of unicellular organisms (and multicellular microorganisms) to understand cellular responses to internal and external stimuli and/or human diseases.

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Whether you’re preparing a manuscript, reviewing a paper, or just exploring the journal, this FAQ answers the essentials—from scope and founders to impact and how to submit. Prefer a tailored path? Pick For authors or For reviewers below.

Peer-reviewed, open-access research using unicellular organisms (and multicellular microorganisms) to understand cellular responses and human disease.

The journal (founded in 2014) is led by its Editors-in-Chief Frank Madeo, Didac Carmona-Gutierrez, and Guido Kroemer

Microbial Cell has been publishing original scientific literature since 2014, and from the very beginning has been managed by active scientists through an independent Publishing House (Shared science Publishers). The journal was conceived as a platform to acknowledge the importance of unicellular organisms, both as model systems as well as in the biological context of human health and disease.

Ever since, Microbial Cell has very positively developed and strongly grown into a respected journal in the unicellular research community and even beyond. This scientific impact is reflected in the yearly number of citations obtained by articles published in Microbial Cell, as recorded by the Web of Science (Clarivate, formerly Thomson/Reuters):

The scientific impact of Microbial Cell is also mirrored in a series of milestones:

2015: Microbial Cell is included in the Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI), a selection of developing journals drafted by Clarivate Analytics based on the candidate’s publishing standards, quality, editorial content, and citation data. Note: As an ESCI-selected journal, Microbial Cell is currently being evaluated in a rigorous and long process to determine an inclusion in the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), which allows the official calculation of Clarivate Analytics’ impact factor.

2016: Microbial Cell is awarded the so-called DOAJ Seal by the selective Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). The DOAJ Seal is an exclusive mark of certification for open access journals granted by DOAJ to journals that adhere to outstanding best practice and achieve an extra high and clear commitment to open access and high publishing standards.

2017: Microbial Cell is included in Pubmed Central (PMC), allowing the archiving of all the journal’s articles in PMC and PubMed.

2019: Microbial Cell is indexed in the prestigious abstract and citation database Scopus after a thorough selection process. This also means that Microbial Cell obtains, for the first time, an official Scopus CiteScore as well as an official journal ranking in the Scimago Journal and Country Ranking.

2022: Microbial Cell’s CiteScore reaches a value of 7.2 for the year 2021, positioning Microbial Cell among the top microbiology journals (previously available CiteScores: 2019: 5.4; 2020: 5.1).

2022: Microbial Cell is indexed in the highly selective Science Citation Index Expanded™, which covers approx. 9,500 of the world’s most impactful journals across 178 scientific disciplines. In their journal selection and curation process, Clarivate´s editors apply 24 ‘quality’ criteria and four ‘impact’ criteria to select the most influential journals in their respective fields. This selection is also a pre-requisite for inclusion in the JCR, which features the impact factor.

2022: Microbial Cell is listed in the Journal Citation Reports™ (JCR), and obtains its first official Journal Impact Factor™ (JIF) for the year 2021: 5.316.

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