While much has been written about the race to modernize industry and agriculture in fascist Italy, the history of animal husbandry during this period has largely been overlooked by scholars. The “Battle of Zootechnics”—the Italian project to centralize and modernize animal husbandry practices and thereby maximize the yield of animal products—was a key element in the state’s plan for achieving economic self-sufficiency. A new article in Isis: A Journal of the History of Science Society examines how the Italian fascist state employed zootechnics to further its aims and reflects upon an important chapter in the tangled history of fascism and science.

An international research team led by Aalborg University with contributions from the University of Vienna has systematically mapped the microbiome of an entire country for the first time. In the study "Microflora Danica," published in the renowned journal Nature, over 10,000 environmental samples from across Denmark were analyzed - on average at intervals of only around 4 square kilometers. The result is an atlas of Danish environmental microbiomes with unprecedented spatial resolution and functional depth. Michael Wagner, Daan Speth, and Andrew Giguere from the Center for Microbiology and Environmental Systems Science at the University of Vienna played a key role in the evaluation of nitrifiers, a key group in the global nitrogen cycle.

GPI anchoring is indispensable for cell-wall integrity and full virulence of the maize pathogen Cochliobolus heterostrophus. Deletion of ChGPI7 or ChFEM1 crippled appressorium formation, exposes chitin, and triggers host immune detection. A total of 124 potential GPI-anchored proteins were predicted, indicating that this pathway may serve as a potential antifungal target.