A new tool for healthcare gives better outbreak forecasts
Peer-Reviewed Publication
This month, we’re focusing on infectious diseases, a topic that affects lives and communities around the world. Here, you’ll find the latest research news, insights, and discoveries shaping how infectious diseases are being studied, prevented, and treated globally.
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 14-Dec-2025 16:11 ET (14-Dec-2025 21:11 GMT/UTC)
Scientists from the Institut Pasteur have genetically analyzed the remains of former soldiers who retreated from Russia in 1812. They detected two pathogens, those responsible for paratyphoid fever and relapsing fever, which correlate with the symptoms described in historical accounts. The study was published as a preprint on bioRxiv on July 16, 2025. It will be published in the journal Current Biology on October 24.
Researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and their collaborators have developed a new technology to track beneficial bacteria after fecal microbiota transplants (FMT). The approach provides a detailed view of how donor microbes take hold and persist in the patients’ gut—not only which bacteria successfully colonized but how they change over time. These insights may guide the design of safer and more effective microbiome-based therapies. The study was published in the October 22 online issue of Nature Microbiology [DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-025-02164-8].
An outbreak investigation among 17 European countries points at a common source for recurring Salmonella Strathcona infections since 2011. Small tomatoes from Sicily (Italy) are the suspected food vehicle related to a total of 643 outbreak cases.
The winners of the Applied Microbiology International Horizon Awards 2025 have been announced. The prizes, awarded by the learned society Applied Microbiology International (AMI), celebrate the brightest minds in the field and promote the research, group, projects, products and individuals who continue to help shape the future of applied microbiology.
A new study published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health found that the loss of US bilateral health aid is projected to result in an additional 2.5 million pediatric TB cases and 340,000 pediatric TB deaths in LMICs between 2025 and 2034, compared to pre-2025 funding levels. Moreover, the possible withdrawal of US support to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria (the Global Fund) along with reduced TB funding from other countries would likely result in an additional 8.9 million child TB cases, and more than 1.5 million child deaths during this period—more than double the expected totals if funding continued at pre-2025 levels.