Hi everyone! This is my first contribution to the daily digest, and I’ll follow others’ lead by starting with the latest preprints concerning Covid-19. Away from the ongoing pandemic, some of the highlights include a look at how commensal gut microbes interact with pathogens, and an insight into deep sea oceanic crust microbiomes.

It seems to be a relatively quiet day today, so I’ve included an article from the University of Bristol which looks at how nanoscopic pillars on the surface of some insect wings protect them against bacteria. Perhaps only loosely a microbiome paper, but it’s worth a read for its electron microscopy alone!

COVID-19

Structure of the SARS-CoV-2 spike receptor-binding domain bound to the ACE2 receptor – Lan et al. – Nature

Preprint: Atazanavir inhibits SARS-CoV-2 replication and pro-inflammatory cytokine production – Fintelman-Rodrigues et al.

Preprint: Amantadine disrupts lysosomal gene expression; potential therapy for COVID19 – Smieszek et al.

Preprint: Potent Antiviral Activities of Type I Interferons to SARS-CoV-2 Infection – Mantlo et al.

Human gut microbiome

Dissecting individual pathogen-commensal interactions within a complex gut microbiota community – Hassall and Unnikrishnan

Animal microbiome

Antibacterial effects of nanopillar surfaces are mediated by cell impedance, penetration and induction of oxidative stress – Jenkins et al. – Nature Communications

Water and extremophile microbiome

Deep microbial proliferation at the basalt interface in 33.5–104 million-year-old oceanic crust – Suzuki et al. – Communications Biology

Food microbiology

How does the microbiome impact pig health? – Sarah Mikesell – The Pig Site

Microbes in the news

Lifestyle trumps geography in determining makeup of gut microbiome – EurekAlert!

Microbes on the market

Gilead taps Second Genome for microbiome biomarker help in a potential $1.5B deal – Connor Hale – FierceBiotech.com