Zoonotic diseases (i.e., diseases passed between animals and humans) represent a major public health problem worldwide. Bacteria, viruses, parasites, and fungi can cause different zoonosis. More than three-quarters of human diseases are caused by pathogens originating from animals or from products of animal origin.
Over the past decade, molecular and genetic analysis of microorganisms causing various zoonotic diseases provided important insights into the biology and the virulence of these pathogens.
The technologies for generating omics information have been substantially progressed in recent years and became available to an increasing number of researchers. Integration of omics information resulted in extensive advances in many aspects of Zoonoses, from microbial detection to delineating mechanisms of pathogenicity and understanding zoonotic disease epidemiology. Omics information includes: Genomics, that is used to study the diversity of the genomes of emerging zoonotic pathogens and the genetic and molecular basis of the host response; Transcriptomics, that allows the detection of transcriptional regulation mechanisms employed by the pathogen and by the response of its host; Proteomics, which may uncover essential interactions between the pathogen and the host cells; Epigenomics, which play a significant role in bacterial phenotypes that are not encoded in the genome and contribute another level of regulation by which the host cells integrates and responds to pathogens signals; and Metabolomics, that provides a chemical fingerprint of thousands of metabolites present in cells , and shed new light on the complexity of the host metabolism as well as of the host-parasite interaction in each stage of the disease. Integration of signals from all these levels of information will contribute to our understanding of the complete system.
In this research topic, we collect articles aiming to illustrate current omics and systems approaches studying one or more of these following issues: the biology and virulence of zoonotic pathogens; the interactions of these microorganisms with their host; and the development of computational models on microbe-disease association prediction.
We invite experts in the related fields to contribute original research articles, methods, perspective, opinion, hypothesis, and theory, as well as reviews, which cover all aspects of omics information of zoonotic pathogens and diseases.
Zoonotic diseases (i.e., diseases passed between animals and humans) represent a major public health problem worldwide. Bacteria, viruses, parasites, and fungi can cause different zoonosis. More than three-quarters of human diseases are caused by pathogens originating from animals or from products of animal origin.
Over the past decade, molecular and genetic analysis of microorganisms causing various zoonotic diseases provided important insights into the biology and the virulence of these pathogens.
The technologies for generating omics information have been substantially progressed in recent years and became available to an increasing number of researchers. Integration of omics information resulted in extensive advances in many aspects of Zoonoses, from microbial detection to delineating mechanisms of pathogenicity and understanding zoonotic disease epidemiology. Omics information includes: Genomics, that is used to study the diversity of the genomes of emerging zoonotic pathogens and the genetic and molecular basis of the host response; Transcriptomics, that allows the detection of transcriptional regulation mechanisms employed by the pathogen and by the response of its host; Proteomics, which may uncover essential interactions between the pathogen and the host cells; Epigenomics, which play a significant role in bacterial phenotypes that are not encoded in the genome and contribute another level of regulation by which the host cells integrates and responds to pathogens signals; and Metabolomics, that provides a chemical fingerprint of thousands of metabolites present in cells , and shed new light on the complexity of the host metabolism as well as of the host-parasite interaction in each stage of the disease. Integration of signals from all these levels of information will contribute to our understanding of the complete system.
In this research topic, we collect articles aiming to illustrate current omics and systems approaches studying one or more of these following issues: the biology and virulence of zoonotic pathogens; the interactions of these microorganisms with their host; and the development of computational models on microbe-disease association prediction.
We invite experts in the related fields to contribute original research articles, methods, perspective, opinion, hypothesis, and theory, as well as reviews, which cover all aspects of omics information of zoonotic pathogens and diseases.