, 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.

, July 11, 2025

Persistence phenotype of adherent-invasive Escherichia coli in response to ciprofloxacin, revealing high-persistence strains

Valeria Pérez-Villalobos1, Roberto Vidal2, Marcela A. Hermoso3,4 and Paula Bustamante1

We investigated the roles of the resident antibiotic resistance plasmid, the stress response protein HtrA, and macrophage-induced persister formation. Our results revealed broad variability in persister cell formation among AIEC strains.

, June 25, 2025

Knocking out histidine ammonia-lyase by using CRISPR-Cas9 abolishes histidine role in the bioenergetics and the life cycle of Trypanosoma cruzi

Janaína de Freitas Nascimento1, María Julia Barisón1, Gabriela Torres Montanaro1, Letícia Marchese1, Rodolpho Ornitz Oliveira Souza1, Letícia Sophia Silva2, Alessandra Aparecida Guarnieri2 and Ariel Mariano Silber1

Recent studies have highlighted the importance of this pathway in ATP production, redox balance, and the maintenance of cellular homeostasis in T. cruzi. In this work, we focus on the first step of the histidine degradation pathway, which is performed by the enzyme histidine ammonia lyase. Here we determined the kinetic and biochemical parameters of the T. cruzi histidine ammonia-lyase.

, June 24, 2025

Dissecting the cell cycle regulation, DNA damage sensitivity and lifespan effects of caffeine in fission yeast

John-Patrick Alao1, Juhi Kumar1, Despina Stamataki2 and Charalampos Rallis1

Our findings show that caffeine accelerates mitotic division and is beneficial for CLS through AMPK. Direct pharmacological targeting of AMPK may serve towards healthspan and lifespan benefits beyond yeasts, given the highly conserved nature of this key regulatory cellular energy sensor.

June 12, 2025

Uga3 influences nitrogen metabolism in Saccharomyces cerevisiae by modulating arginine biosynthesis

Nicolás Urtasun1,2,a, Sebastián Aníbal Muñoz1,a, Martín Arán3 and Mariana Bermúdez-Moretti1

Nitrogen metabolism in Saccharomyces cerevisiae is tightly regulated to optimize the utilization of available nitrogen sources. Uga3 is a known transcription factor involved in the gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) pathway; however, its broader role in nitrogen metabolism remains unclear.

, May 22, 2025
An adenine model of inborn metabolism errors alters TDP-43 aggregation and reduces its toxicity in yeast revealing insights into protein misfolding diseases

An adenine model of inborn metabolism errors alters TDP-43 aggregation and reduces its toxicity in yeast revealing insights into protein misfolding diseases

Sangeun Park, Sei-Kyoung Park, Peter Blair and Susan W. Liebman

This work offers new insights into the potential interactions between me-tabolite-based amyloids and pathological protein aggregates, with broad implications for understanding protein misfolding diseases.

, April 14, 2025
Microbiota and metabolome dynamics induced by Shiga toxin-producing <i>E. coli</i> in an <i>in vitro</i> model of an infant’s colon

Microbiota and metabolome dynamics induced by Shiga toxin-producing E. coli in an in vitro model of an infant’s colon

Mariana Izquierdo1,a, Deborah O’Sullivan2,a, Ophélie Uriot2, Morgane Brun2, Claude Durif2, Sylvain Denis2, Pablo Gallardo1, Cormac G M Gahan3-5, Lucie Etienne-Mesmin2, Stéphanie Blanquet-Diot2,b and Mauricio J. Farfan1.b

This study provides new evidence of the impact of EHEC in the microbiota and metabolome dynamics in an in vitro gut model that could be useful in understanding their physiopathology in this at-risk population, considering inter-individual variabilities in gut microbiota.

, March 20, 2025
Ampicillin treatment in persister cell studies may cause non-physiological artifacts

Ampicillin treatment in persister cell studies may cause non-physiological artifacts

Michel Fasnacht1,2, Hena Comic1,2, Isabella Moll1,2

This study shows at the example of L2 how insufficient purification of ampicillin persister cells can lead to the generation of non-physiological artifacts and provides a novel tool to improve the removal of residual cell debris.

, March 19, 2025
<i>Clostridium scindens</i> promotes gallstone formation by inducing intrahepatic neutrophil extracellular traps through CXCL1 produced by colonic epithelial cells

Clostridium scindens promotes gallstone formation by inducing intrahepatic neutrophil extracellular traps through CXCL1 produced by colonic epithelial cells

Wenchao Yao1,a, Yuanhang He2,3,a, Zhihong Xie2,3, Qiang Wang2,3, Yang Chen2,4, Jingjing Yu2,3, Xuxu Liu2,3, Dongbo Xue2,3 , Liyi Wang2,3 and Chenjun Hao2,3

Through in vivo and in vitro experiments, we validated the reliability of C. scindens stimulating colonic epithelial cells to produce TLR2, activating the NF-κB signaling pathway, promoting CXCL1 expres-sion, and inducing intrahepatic neutrophil NETosis, which may be associated with gallstone formation.

, February 20, 2025
Integrative Omics reveals changes in the cellular landscape of peroxisome-deficient <i>pex3</i> yeast cells

Integrative Omics reveals changes in the cellular landscape of peroxisome-deficient pex3 yeast cells

Tjasa Kosir1,a, Hirak Das2,a, Marc Pilegaard Pedersen1, Ann-Kathrin Richard2, Marco Anteghini3,4, Vitor Martins dos Santos4,5, Silke Oeljeklaus2, Ida J. van der Klei1 and Bettina Warscheid2

To uncover the consequences of peroxisome deficiency, we compared Saccharomyces cerevisiae wild-type with pex3 cells, which lack peroxisomes, employing quantitative proteomics and transcriptomics technologies.

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, January 5, 2014

A novel mechanism involved in the coupling of mitochondrial biogenesis to oxidative phosphorylation

Jelena Ostojić1, Jean-Paul di Rago2,3, Geneviève Dujardin1,*

This article comments on a study by Ostojić et al. (Cell Metabolism, 2013), which has uncovered a regulatory loop by which the biogenesis of a major enzyme of the OXPHOS pathway, the respiratory complex III, is coupled to the energy producing activity of the mitochondria.

, January 4, 2014

Stalling autophagy: a new function for Listeria phospholipases

Ivan Tattoli1,2, Matthew T. Sorbara2, Dana J. Philpott2 and Stephen E. Girardin1,*

This article comments on a study biy Tattoli et al. (EMBO J, 2013), which demonstrated that Listeria PI-PLC and PC-PLC contribute to the bacterial escape from autophagy through a mechanism that involves direct inhibition of the autophagic flux in the infected cells

, January 4, 2014

Identifying the assembly pathway of cyanophage inside the marine bacterium using electron cryo-tomography

Wei Dai1, Michael F. Schmid1, Jonathan A. King2, Wah Chiu1,*

Thiswork comments on a study by Dai et al. (Nature 2013) that illustrates that electron cryo-tomography is an approach whereby one can capture directly structural snapshots of transient phage assembly intermediates during maturation process. Such analysis can be generalizable not only to human viruses in human cells but also various molecular machines undergoing biological processes.

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, February 21, 2025

It takes four to tango: the cooperative adventure of scientific publishing

Didac Carmona-Gutierrez1,2, Katharina Kainz1 and Frank Madeo1-3

This Editorial is the 500th article published in Microbial Cell, a journey that started in 2014 and has seen the journal grow steadily and maintain itself as a respected community platform. The foundation that has allowed for and driven this development – as for any responsible journal – is composed of four essential pillars: the readers, the authors, the editors and the referees.

, August 20, 2024
Patterns of protein synthesis in the budding yeast cell cycle: variable or constant?

Patterns of protein synthesis in the budding yeast cell cycle: variable or constant?

Eun-Gyu No, Heidi M Blank and Michael Polymenis

Proteins are the principal macromolecular constituent of proliferating cells, and protein synthesis is viewed as a primary metric of cell growth. While there are celebrated examples of proteins whose levels are periodic in the cell cycle (e.g., cyclins), the concentration of most proteins was not thought to change in the cell cycle, but some recent results challenge this notion. The ‘bulk’ protein is the focus of this article, specifically the rate of its synthesis, in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

, June 1, 2023

Ribose 5-phosphate: the key metabolite bridging the metabolisms of nucleotides and amino acids during stringent response in Escherichia coli?

Paulina Katarzyna Grucela1, Tobias Fuhrer2, Uwe Sauer2, Yanjie Chao3 and Yong Everett Zhang1

Here we propose the metabolite ribose 5’-phosphate as the key link between nucleotide and amino acid metabolisms and a working model integrating both the transcriptional and metabolic effects of (p)ppGpp on E. coli physiological adaptation during the stringent response.

August 24, 2022

Flagellated bacterial porter for in situ tumor vaccine

Haiheng Xu1, Yiqiao Hu1, 2 and Jinhui Wu1, 2, 3

Cancer immunotherapy, which use the own immune system to attack tumors, are increasingly popular treatments. But, due to the tumor immunosuppressive microenvironment, the antigen presentation in the tumor is limited. Recently, a growing number of people use bacteria to stimulate the body’s immunity for tumor treatment due to bacteria themselves have a variety of elements that activate Toll-like receptors. Here, we discuss the use of motility of flagellate bacteria to transport antigens to the tumor periphery to activate peritumoral dendritic cells to enhance the effect of in situ tumor vaccines.

August 1, 2022

The rise of Candida auris: from unique traits to co-infection potential

Nadine B. Egger1,§, Katharina Kainz1,§, Adina Schulze1, Maria A. Bauer1, Frank Madeo1-3 and Didac Carmona-Gutierrez1

Candida auris is a multidrug resistant (MDR) fungal pathogen with a crude mortality rate of 30-60%. First identified in 2009, C. auris has been rapidly rising to become a global risk in clinical settings and was declared an urgent health threat by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A concerted global action is thus needed to successfully tackle the challenges created by this emerging fungal pathogen. In this brief article, we underline the importance of unique virulence traits, including its easy transformation, its persistence outside the host and its resilience against multiple cellular stresses, as well as of environmental factors that have mainly contributed to the rise of this superbug.

April 4, 2022

A hundred spotlights on microbiology: how microorganisms shape our lives

Didac Carmona-Gutierrez1, Katharina Kainz1, Andreas Zimmermann1, Sebastian J. Hofer1, Maria A. Bauer1, Christoph Ruckenstuhl1, Guido Kroemer2-4 and Frank Madeo1,5,6

Viral, bacterial, fungal and protozoal biology is of cardinal importance for the evolutionary history of life, ecology, biotechnology and infectious diseases. Various microbiological model systems have fundamentally contributed to the understanding of molecular and cellular processes, including the cell cycle, cell death, mitochondrial biogenesis, vesicular fusion and autophagy, among many others. Microbial interactions within the environment have profound effects on many fields of biology, from ecological diversity to the highly complex and multifaceted impact of the microbiome on human health. Also, biotechnological innovation and corresponding industrial operations strongly depend on microbial engineering. With this wide range of impact in mind, the peer-reviewed (…)

March 21, 2022

Yeast goes viral: probing SARS-CoV-2 biology using S. cerevisiae

Brandon Ho1, Raphael Loll-Krippleber1 and Grant W. Brown1

The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has long been an outstanding platform for understanding the biology of eukaryotic cells. Robust genetics, cell biology, molecular biology, and biochemistry complement deep and detailed genome annotation, a multitude of genome-scale strain collections for functional genomics, and substantial gene conservation with Metazoa to comprise a powerful model for modern biological research. Recently, the yeast model has demonstrated its utility in a perhaps unexpected area, that of eukaryotic virology. Here we discuss three innovative applications of the yeast model system to reveal functions and investigate variants of proteins encoded by the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

, December 6, 2021

Murals meet microbes: at the crossroads of microbiology and cultural heritage

Maria A. Bauer1, Katharina Kainz1, Christoph Ruckenstuhl1, Frank Madeo1-3 and Didac Carmona-Gutierrez1

This article comments on the duality of microorganisms in the conservation and restoration of cultural heritage, which encompasses the negative impact of damaging microorganisms and recent advances in using specific microorganisms and microbial-based technologies for cultural heritage preservation.

, September 21, 2021

Urm1, not quite a ubiquitin-like modifier?

Lars Kaduhr1, Cindy Brachmann1, Keerthiraju Ethiraju Ravichandran2,3, James D. West4, Sebastian Glatt2 and Raffael Schaffrath1

This article comments on work published by Brachmann et al. (Redox Biol, 2020), which studied urmylation of the yeast 2-Cys peroxiredoxin Ahp1, uncovering that promiscuous lysine target sites and specific redox requirements determine the Urm1 acceptor activity of the peroxiredoxin.

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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.

Check Article Types and Manuscript Preparation guidelines. Submit online via Scholastica.