The associated Research Briefing is now out, with additional insights into the mission behind the paper and future directions. We hope this work will contribute to positive environmental change. (11/11) doi.org/10.1038/s415...

'Study uncovered 588 inhibitory interactions between 168 chemicals of concern and common human gut bacteria'
Credit: Roux, & Lindell, et al. Industrial & agricultural chemicals exhibit antimicrobial activity against human gut bacteria in vitro. @natmicrobiol.nature.com
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#MicroSky #MicrobiomeSky

Thanks so much for featuring our recent article! link to the paper : www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Many thanks to @sonjablasche.bsky.social , @guan06rui.bsky.social from @mrc-tu.bsky.social @cambiochem.bsky.social @cam.ac.uk @lisamaierlab.bsky.social y.social @ghammeranne.bsky.social , and other authors not in bsky.(10/10)

This has been a great collaborative effort, starting with Anna Lindell and @skamrad.bsky.social growth screens and expanding into mechanistic work. Grateful to be part of such an intellectually generous multidisciplinary team. Constructive reviewers also strengthened the story since preprint. (9/10)

While our study can’t directly predict in vivo effects, our data encourages collection of pollutant exposure data in microbiome studies, and provides guidance for the prioritisation of chemicals and molecular effects that should be monitored. (8/10)

Our results challenge the categorical labelling of chemicals, and suggest that toxicological assessments of chemicals that are likely to enter food chain should also consider their effects on gut bacteria #Toxicology #Ecotoxicology (7/10)

Some pollutants selected for loss-of-function mutations in metabolic genes, including host-relevant pathways. This raises the possibility that exposure to pollutants could impact the selection landscape in the gut, leading to metabolic alterations in microbiome-host interaction pathways. (6/10)

Chemical-genetic screens in P. merdae and B. thetaiotaomicron showed conserved efflux pathways modulating fitness under chemical stress, with implications for antibiotic resistance. E.g.,TBBPA and closantel selected for acrR mutants that showed increased tolerance to ciprofloxacin. (5/10)

The chemical diversity of >1000 tested compounds enabled ML-learning predictions of chemical-bacteria interactions. Our results show that data-driven toxicity models can support hazard and risk assessments and help guide safe-by-design chemistry for future pesticides and industrial chemicals. (4/10)

Screening at 20 μM allowed comparison with previous data on human-targeted drugs. We find shared phylum-level susceptibility patterns between therapeutic drugs and chemical contaminants. We also show that pollutants,like drugs, can alter the composition of synthetic communities. (3/10).

We tested 1,076 chemical pollutants -pesticides and industrial compounds that can enter food and water-, against 22 representative gut bacteria. We found 588 inhibitory interactions involving 168 chemicals, with fungicides and industrial chemicals showing the highest proportion of inhibitors (2/10)