Gut Pathogens making a positive impact in 2012

The year has started positively for Gut Pathogens with the news that the journal will receive its first Impact Factor in June 2012.Gut Pathogens is aiming to be ranked in the first quartile of Gastroenterology and Hepatology journals.

Gut Pathogens, an internationally recognized journal, boasts an Editorial Board consisting of leading researchers from around the world. A key factor in the journal's success has been its commitment to publishing articles that are topical and relevant to researchers in this field. In particular, Gut Pathogens has consistently published highly popular articles on probiotics, and is becoming a key journal for researchers in the field to submit their research. The journal will continue to publish high quality articles on probiotics in the future. (Image credit: Probiotic Lactobacillus salivarius. Sleator, Gut Pathogens 2010 2:5)

There has been an increasing interest in pathogens such as Clostridium difficile, E. coli and Salmonella because of the significant emerging health problems they are causing in western countries. Gut Pathogens would like to invite scientists to submit their research on these and similar themes to the journal for publication in 2012.

Posted by Srimathy Sriskantharajah at Biomed Central Blog on 26/1/2012

Open Access versus ‘doing business on corpses’: Is PLoS ONE the choicest journal of the TB community?

It is heartening to see PLoS ONE emerge as a preferred destination for tuberculosis and lung diseases research and the journal has already published >1300 articles in this area (http://tinyurl.com/cvnvdnb), a volume equivalent to a 13 year output of the journal Tuberculosis (@ 100 articles per year) and of 6 years output of the International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (IJTLD) (@ 240 articles per year).
Given this, I must congratulate all those authors who have by publishing in ONE in a way dumped the might of the journals that block Open Access to TB research - something like 'doing business on the corpses'. They have for years blocked access to TB works - the situation worsened in high burden countries such as India (where 320000 people died of TB in 2010 alone). Very surprising and painful is the reality that one of these journals, the IJTLD is published by the International Union Against TB and Lung Disease or the Union (www.theunion.org), one of the major champions of the cause of TB. While the Union is doing very laudable efforts in the area of TB control and prevention, I would urge them to consider widening unconditional Open Access to the IJTLD contents by the Indian TB communities (rather than linking access to membership/subscription). Why would someone become a member of the Union just to read an article in need? Currently, the Union makes available the journal through Ingenta Connect who charge about USD 40.00 per view, per article when accessed directly. The cost per view charged thereby is equivalent of the cost of food/ration for one month for a mid size, lower middle class family in India. The same is true with Tuberculosis articles, each accessible at the cost of USD 35.00 levied by Elsevier. The Union receives huge funding and donations from various sources and they should seriously think on converting their journal in to an Open Access, online only journal to better serve the down trodden.
World over, the research on TB is mainly funded by tax payers' money and in no way the TB community should allow these journals to carve business out of this dreaded epidemic. PLoS ONE on the other hand generously waives off cost of article processing for all the authors who request for the same. Each article is available free of cost for unlimited download and distribution with no strings attached. That's why PLoS ONE stands today as one of the choicest journal of the TB researchers.

German cows get clean chit for the outbreak of Shiga toxin-producing E. coli O104:H4

No evidence of the Shiga toxin-producing E. coli O104:H4 outbreak strain or enteroaggregative E. coli (EAEC) found in cattle faeces in northern Germany, the hotspot of the 2011 HUS outbreak area

Lothar H Wieler, Torsten Semmler, Inga Eichhorn, Esther M Antao, Bianca Kinnemann, Lutz Geue, Helge Karch, Sebastian Guenther and Astrid Bethe  Gut Pathogens 2011, 3:17 doi:10.1186/1757-4749-3-17   Published: 3 November 2011

Ruminants, in particular bovines, are the primary reservoir of Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC), but whole genome analyses of the current German ESBL-producing O104:H4 outbreak strain of sequence type (ST) 678 showed this strain to be highly similar to enteroaggregative E. coli (EAEC). Strains of the EAEC pathotype are basically adapted to the human host. To clarify whether in contrast to this paradigm, the O104:H4 out-break strain and/or EAEC may also be able to colonize ruminants, we screened a total of 2.000 colonies from faecal samples of 100 cattle from 34 different farms - all located in the HUS outbreak region of Northern Germany - for genes associated with the O104:H4 HUS outbreak strain (stx2, terD, rfbO104, fliCH4), STEC (stx1, stx2, escV), EAEC (pAA, aggR, astA), and ESBL-production (blaCTX-M, blaTEM, blaSHV). Results: The faecal samples contained neither the HUS outbreak strain nor any EAEC. As the current outbreak strain belongs to ST678 and displays an enteroaggregative and ESBL-producing phenotype, we additionally screened selected strains for ST678 as well as the aggregative adhesion pattern in HEp-2 cells. However, we were unable to find any strains belonging to ST678 or showing an aggregative adhesion pattern. A high percentage of animals (28%) shed STEC, corroborating previous knowledge and thereby proving the validity of our study. One of the STEC also harboured the LEE pathogenicity island. In addition, eleven animals shed ESBL-producing E. coli. Conclusions: While we are aware of the limitations of our survey, our data support the theory, that, in contrast to other Shiga-toxin producing E. coli, cattle are not the reservoir for the O104:H4 outbreak strain or other EAEC, but that the outbreak strain seems to be adapted to humans or might have yet another reservoir, raising new questions about the epidemiology of STEC O104:H4.  Access full article free of cost