The fruit processing industry is an important economic sector worldwide, whereas a wide range of plant pathogens affects the shelf life of fruits, resulting in great economic losses. Post-harvest fungicides are often applied in the fruit processing industry to address post-harvest infections. However, various fungicides have been reported to exhibit toxicity to aquatic and terrestrial non-target organisms. Thus, effective technological solutions are needed to treat fungicide-containing wastewaters generated by the fruit packaging industry. Regarding biological methods, few approaches have been explored to deplete high-strength fungicide-based wastewaters derived from the post-harvest treatment of fruits. Despite the application of post-harvest fungicides for several decades, we are still missing the implementation of a full-scale biobased system to treat fungicide-rich wastewater generated by the fruit-packaging industry. On the other hand, fixed and fluidized bed bioreactors compared to suspended solids systems result in higher removal efficiencies. Based on the advantages of such bioreactor technology and the recent findings regarding the depuration of post-harvest fungicides in these biosystems, immobilized cell bioreactors appear to be a promising biological approach to treat persistent fungicides present in fruit packaging wastewater. However, bioreactors technology scaling up for the biotreatment of fungicide-rich wastewaters from the fruit packaging industry is challenging. Towards this direction, “Minotaur”, a 3-year research project financed by EU and Greek funds, is on the way to develop a full-scale bioreactor technology for treating fungicide-based wastewaters.

The research effort is effective when published and becomes available to the scientific community. Scientists professional success correlates to a greater extent with their research (internationalization). Although many international journals are committed to disseminating research, there are many difficulties accessing master and doctoral theses due to language barriers. Additionally, publishing "Opinion or editorials" on hot topics based on the findings from empirical evidence on a global scale might explore ideas and stimulate researchers to focus on such topics. The GMPC-Thesis and Opinion platform will give master and Ph.D. students the chance to publish their thesis-review on an international platform. Moreover, it will allow the pioneers in the sciences to show their opinions in a global portal

The present case series study presents the preliminary data of 347 of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus type 2 (SARS-CoV-2) positively tested patients in the Mittelbaden hospital, Baden-Baden Bühl, Germany, during the period from March to June 2020. Among the 347 patients, 55% were males. The mean age-wise was 52.5±20.2 years in the overall cohort and 78.9±11.1 years in fatal outcome cases. A total of 120/347 patients (34.6%) required hospitalization, but only 36/347 (10.37%) cases required intensive care. The overall fatality rate was 6.6% (23/347), of which 12 patients were from the intensive care unit. The most frequent clinical symptoms observed were cough (62.5%), hyperthermia (47.8%), rhinorrhea (25.1%), sore throat (23.1%), dyspnea (22.8%), and headache (19.3%). Laboratory data analysis showed no specific findings, but severe laboratory disturbances could predict critical illness. A higher risk of severe illness or lethal outcome in elderly patients with several comorbidities was the most frequent. The fight against COVID-19 infection in Germany seems to be more successful during the first wave than in other countries. The improvement of the healthcare system against infectious outbreaks depends directly on the analysis of regional factors

This study main objective was to update avian influenza (AI) epidemiological situation, including molecular characterization reassortment analysis and genotyping of circulating AI virus (AIV) subtypes in Egyptian poultry farms between 2017 and 2019. As a necessity for such work, improved diagnostic tools were developed for AIV detection. Subtype H9N2 infections were detected in 27 out of 39 examined farms and were frequently mixed with high pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N8 in 22/39 farms. Next-generation and Sanger sequencing helped to define novel reassortant HPAI H5N2 and low pathogenic avian influenza (LPAI) H9N2 in Egypt. Systematic reassortment analysis confirmed at least seven genotypes of HPAI H5NX viruses of clade 2.3.4.4b and three genotypes of LPAI H9N2 circulating in Egypt. Several internal genes of AIVs previously detected in wild birds in Egypt were represented in the genome of novel reassortants of both HP H5Nx and H9N2 viruses suggesting local reassortment processes.

In the current study, ten avian pathogenic E. coli (APEC) isolates of the most predominant APEC serogroups isolated from broiler chickens in Egypt were screened for their virulence and antimicrobial resistance genes pattern using PCR. Five selected virulence gene patterns were further investigated for their in-vivo pathogenicity test. Results showed a 100% prevalence of the ß-lactams and tetracyclines resistance genes. However, aminoglycoside and quinolone resistance genes were not detected. Also, 80% of the tested isolates harbored mcr-1 gene, colistin resistance gene. In-vivo pathogenic strains consistently harbored the virulence gene pattern of fimH, fimA, papC, iutA, and tsh. Additionally, the tsh gene was consistently detected with lethal APEC isolates in day-old chicks. These results highlighted the high prevalence of antimicrobial and virulence genes in APEC that potentially represent a public health concern. In this study, the virulence genes fimH, fimA, papC, iutA, and tsh were the most common virulence gene patterns associated with pathogenicity in day-old chicks