Nature Microbiology, Published online: 02 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s41564-026-02500-6Multiomic experiments using defined and native gut communities reveal that complex dietary glycans mediate the dominance of Prevotellaceae in non-industrialized gut metagenomes through signalling-mediated cross-feeding with Enterobacteriaceae.

Menopause is an important biological transition with up to 72 symptoms that shapes aging trajectories across organs and encompasses ~40% of the female lifespan. Although menopause awareness is increas...

Nature Metabolism, Published online: 02 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s42255-026-01617-6This study shows that locus-specific DNA methylation changes in oocytes serve as an epigenetic memory linking maternal obesity to intergenerational metabolic dysfunction.

Nature Microbiology, Published online: 02 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s41564-026-02501-5A GTPase complex conserved across alveolates gates exocytosis in the parasite Toxoplasma and the ciliate Tetrahymena. In Toxoplasma, an added apical vesicle tightens control over rhoptry secretion, a process critical to host cell invasion.

Nature Reviews Microbiology, Published online: 02 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s41579-026-01376-xBacteria deploy diverse immune systems to counter phage infection, yet how these systems sense invasion remains incompletely understood. This Review categorizes phage-derived triggers and outlines emerging principles that govern immune recognition of phage infection.

Nature Metabolism, Published online: 01 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s42255-026-01643-4In a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, intermittent dasatinib and quercetin treatment over 21 weeks improves liver fibrosis in patients with MASH, as shown by paired liver biopsies, and reduces senescence and fibrotic gene signatures, as demonstrated by single-nucleus transcriptomics.

Nature Metabolism, Published online: 31 August 2026; doi:10.1038/s42255-026-01606-9Visceral and subcutaneous adipose tissue differ in their propensity for thermogenic remodelling, yet the mechanisms enforcing this depot specificity remain incompletely understood. Yuan et al. identify neutrophil-derived serine proteases as depot-specific suppressors of visceral fat beiging, expanding the role of innate immunity to shaping adipose tissue plasticity.

Prof. dr. Diether Lambrechts (KU Leuven/VIB) en prof. dr. Patrice Cani (UCLouvain) hebben vandaag de Francqui-Collen Prijs 2026 ontvangen, een van de hoogste wetenschappelijke onderscheidingen van ons...

PODCAST Le prix Francqui, considéré comme la plus haute distinction scientifique belge, vient couronner cette année les recherches menées depuis vingt ans par le professeur Patrice Cani, chercheur au Louvain Drug Research Institute. Sa spécialité: le microbiote intestinal. Le scientifique s’est imposé au fil de sa carrière comme l’un des grands spécialistes de cet univers microscopique peuplé de milliards de bactéries.

Le chercheur de l’UCLouvain reçoit ce mardi le prestigieux Prix Francqui-Collen 2026, pour ses recherches sur le microbiote et les maladies métaboliques. ... %

Le Thuc and García-Cáceres discuss the effect of obesity-induced systemic inflammation on the brain, including hypothalamic circuits for whole-body energy homeostasis as well as cognitive function.

The field of personalized nutrition hypothesizes that ‘big data’ — biological, behavioural, social and environmental — can be leveraged to make more precise and effective dietary recommendations to individuals for improving health outcomes, compared to generic dietary advice. This article describes the research questions that need to be answered to understand whether personalized nutrition brings additional clinical utility.

In this Review, the authors highlight cancer cachexia as a complex and multifactorial disorder, and discuss the underlying host-driven and tumour-driven metabolic changes, therapeutic opportunities and the pertinent challenges in the treatment of cancer cachexia.

A planetary-scale analysis of over 85,000 metagenomes establishes a framework for exploring the structure and drivers of global microbial habitats, revealing that generalist species bridge ecological ...

In this Review, Singh and colleagues discuss the impacts of key climate extremes on soil-borne pathogens, plant microbiomes and host physiology that ultimately determine disease outcomes, as well as the eco-evolutionary mechanisms by which pathogens, hosts and microbiomes may adapt to climate extremes. Finally, they propose an integrated pathway for harnessing microbiomes to address the critical challenges posed by climate extremes.

Experimental evolution of fission yeast (Schizosaccharomyces pombe) in the same environment as a previous experiment with budding yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) reveals parallel evolution but distin...

Une bactérie, dénommée Dolosigranulum pigrum, pourrait prévenir le covid long, une affection qui touche 400 000 Belges. Cette découverte a été faite par des scientifiques de l’UCLouvain et des Cliniques universitaires Saint-Luc. Moins abondante dans le nasopharynx des personnes qui développent des symptômes persistants dans le temps, cette bactérie offre une piste potentielle à la création d’un probiotique à administrer en préventif.

Cette année, le Printemps des Sciences  fête son 25e anniversaire. Une édition placée sous le signe de la culture scientifique: une thématique que nous apprécions particulièrement chez Daily Science. C’est donc tout naturellement que nous nous associons à cette vaste opération de sensibilisation aux sciences, coordonnée par le réseau interuniversitaire Sciences.be, qui se déroule à Bruxelles et en Wallonie. Tout au long de la semaine prochaine, outre la série impressionnante d’activités proposée par les universités et les hautes écoles participantes, Daily Science vous invite chaque matin à aller à la rencontre d’une actrice ou d’un acteur de la recherche scientifique.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is linked to an elevated fecal abundance of Enterobacteriaceae, but the ecological drivers of this shift and its impact on disease progression remain unclear. The uremic t...

Silva et al. perform a global analysis of over 11,000 gut microbiomes and reveal that uncultured bacteria are key markers of gut health. The uncultured genus CAG-170 is strongly linked to low gut dysb...

Hexokinase detachment from the outer mitochondrial membrane is shown to support aerobic glycolysis in cancer cells. Differential localization of the HK1 isoform to the outer mitochondrial membrane, compared to the HK2 isoform, explains the conditional essentiality of HK2 in cancer cells cultured in physiologic media.

Des chercheurs de l'UCLouvain, en collaboration avec des experts de huit pays européens, ont fait une avancée majeure dans l'étude de notre microbiote intestinal. Ils ont découvert Dysosmobacter welbionis, une bactérie capable de transformer un nutriment végétal courant, le myo-inositol, en butyrate, une molécule cruciale pour le métabolisme et la santé intestinale. L'importance de cette découverte réside dans le potentiel de cette bactérie à améliorer notre compréhension du lien entre alimentation et santé, notamment pour les personnes qui tolèrent mal les fibres fermentescibles. Cette avancée pourrait ouvrir des pistes prometteuses pour traiter ou prévenir des affections liées à une déficience en butyrate.

Uno studio internazionale, a cui ha partecipato anche l’Italia, ha identificato un batterio intestinale che potrebbe aiutare a prevenire malattie metaboliche come diabete, obesità e fegato grasso. La…

Des chercheurs de l’UCLouvain et de huit pays européens ont identifié une bactérie intestinale humaine capable de transformer un nutriment végétal en une molécule essentielle au bon fonctionnement de…

Studio internazionale con partecipazione italiana rileva il ruolo protettivo del batterio per il fegato e il metabolismo Potrebbe essere un batterio intestinale l’inaspettato alleato nella prevenzione e nella gestione delle malattie metaboliche. A rivelarlo è uno studio internazionale pubblicato sulla rivista Gut, che ha visto la partecipazione di ricercatori italiani del Cnr-Ispaam di Portici, dell’Università […]

Dietary restriction promotes the expansion of effector T cells via ketone bodies, which enhances anti-tumour immunity and synergizes with immunotherapy in mice.

Obesity is a global public health concern closely linked to cardiometabolic complications. This Comment provides our views on recent breakthroughs, emerging innovations and future needs of therapeutic interventions to counteract obesity and its associated health risks.

In this Review, Galli and colleagues discuss the mechanisms and associated biomarkers of traditional and emerging factors responsible for the residual risk of recurrent adverse cardiovascular events i...

Proof-of-concept of a humanised gut-brain axis ex vivo model with physiological coupling of intestinal and blood-brain barrier for mechanistical assessment of butyrate- or fiber-rich diets on the sero...

Qiao et al. identify gut microbes and amino acid-metabolizing genes that influence tumor burden. A Bacteroides asparaginase, bo-ansB, modulates host tumor responses to dietary asparagine (Asn) by depl...

Nature Metabolism, Published online: 08 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s42255-025-01425-4Elevated adipocyte-derived AFABP in obesity disrupts iron homeostasis in intestinal stem cells (ISCs), which impairs PPARα signalling and blocks ISC differentiation after injury.

Exposure to twelve widely used preservative food additives are associated with a higher incidence of type 2 diabetes in the French NutriNet-Santé cohort of 108,723 adults, supporting recommendations to favour fresh and minimally processed foods

Yabut and Drucker discuss clinical and preclinical evidence about the potential roles of GLP-1 medicines on cancer incidence, development and therapy and speculate about their mechanism on cancer cell...

By studying metabolism across day and night in human participants, Marjot et al. show that MASLD is a nighttime disease driven by poor insulin action and low insulin levels. These daily patterns persist after weight loss, suggesting that nighttime metabolic dysfunction is a key driver of liver fat accumulation.

How cancer cells subvert immunity to colonize the lymph node remains unclear. Terasaki et al. uncover that lymph node metastasis may be driven by an immune-to-cancer mitochondria transfer axis that impairs immune function and augments cancer immune evasion programs through type I interferon signaling.

Non-nutritive sensory components of high-fat diet, such as bacon flavour, are sufficient to impair metabolic health in offspring in mice.

The glucagon-like peptide-2 receptor (GLP-2R) is recognized as a potential target for the treatment of obesity and type 2 diabetes (T2D). Yet, the impact and mechanism of GLP-2R activation on these me...

This multicenter study demonstrates use of dried and capillary blood as a minimally invasive, scalable approach for Alzheimer’s biomarker testing in research, with potential as a widely scalable population-based research approach, especially in resource-limited settings.

Nature Metabolism, Published online: 02 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s42255-025-01407-6The authors use Perturb-seq analysis in human pancreatic islet beta cells, as well as in vivo and in vitro analyses, to identify potential therapeutic targets for type 2 diabetes, including ZZEF1, which regulates insulin synthesis and cellular stress in islet β cells.