{
  "id": 10116084,
  "title": "Spatiotemporal dynamics and stability of multi-kingdom microbial communities in hospital sinks acting as persistent pathogen reservoirs",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/26/spatiotemporal-dynamics-and-stability-of-multi-kingdom-microbial",
  "topic": "science",
  "section": "Science",
  "published": "2026-09-26T00:00:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "bioRxiv",
    "slug": "biorxiv",
    "url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.09.25.754391v1?rss=1"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Hospital sink drains serve as persistent reservoirs for nosocomial pathogens, but understanding their associated microbial communities remains limited. The study characterizes multi-kingdom microbial communities in 14 sinks from a former intensive care unit (ICU) over a 17-month period during renovation and transition to clinical use. This comprehensive analysis, integrating multi-kingdom meta-taxonomic profiling, culturomics, and phenotypic resistance testing, reveals a highly conserved multi-kingdom core within these sinks that remains resilient despite significant structural changes and periods of inactivity. While this core remains constant, community composition changes along a temporal gradient due to structural and anthropogenic shifts. Each sink develops as a unique microecosystem influenced by local environmental factors. Network modeling demonstrates these communities are structured ecological units, with multidrug-resistant WHO-priority pathogens embedded within them alongside often-neglected fungi and protozoa. The findings emphasize that hospital sink drains are persistent and structured multi-kingdom microbial reservoirs, housing clinically relevant multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs). Their temporal stability and unique signatures underscore the necessity to consider the broader microbial community when monitoring hospital environmental reservoirs and devising infection-control strategies.",
  "summary": "Hospital sink drains act as persistent reservoirs for nosocomial pathogens, yet the structure and long-term stability of their associated microbial communities remain poorly known. Here, we present an extensive characterization integrating multi-kingdom meta-taxonomic profiling (16S rRNA, ITS, and 18S rRNA, n=93 samples) with culturomics (n>4000 isolates) and phenotypic resistance testing across…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}