Leo van Overbeek

• Wageningen University & Research

In recent years, microbiomes and their potential applications for human, animal or plant health, food production and environmental management came into the spotlight of major national and international policies and strategies. This has been accompanied by substantial R&D investments in both public and private sectors, with an increasing number of p...

Soil suppressiveness can reduce the damage by plant parasitic nematodes (PPN) in agricultural soils and is conveyed by the activity of soil microorganisms. While natural suppressiveness has been reported, it is still poorly understood if soil suppressiveness can be elicited by manipulating the soil microbial community. In the present study we asses...

Background Antibiotic resistance genes will spread via soil fertilized with animal manure to food products. Especially plants whose harvested products can be consumed freshly are of concern. The aim of this study was to assess the impact of sulfadiazine (SDZ)-manured soil on the occurrence of sulfonamide (SA) resistance genes in freshly consumable...

Microbiomes have highly important roles for ecosystem functioning and carry out key functions that support planetary health, including nutrient cycling, climate regulation, and water filtration. Microbiomes are also intimately associated with complex multicellular organisms such as humans, other animals, plants, and insects and perform crucial role...

Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) is commonly used as a biological control agent (BCA) to control insect pests in edible plant production and can as such be introduced into the food chain of fresh produce. Using standard food diagnostics Bt will be detected and reported as presumptive B. cereus. Tomato plants are often sprayed with Bt biopesticides for i...

In addition to challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss, the sustainability and resilience of agrifood systems worldwide are currently challenged by new threats, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the Ukraine war. Furthermore, the resilience and sustainability of our agrifood systems need to be enhanced in ways that simultaneously increa...

Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt), used as a biological control agent (BCA), can persist on plants, and from there can be introduced into the final food product. In routine food safety diagnostics, these Bt residues cannot be distinguished from natural populations of Bacillus cereus present in plants and all are enumerated as "presumptive B. cereus." In...

Bacteria are part of the insect gut system and influence many physiological traits of their host. Gut bacteria may even reduce or block the transmission of arboviruses in several species of arthropod vectors. Culicoides biting midges are important arboviral vectors of several livestock and wildlife diseases, yet limited information is available on...

Microbiomes are all around us in natural and cultivated ecosystems, for example, soils, plants, animals and our own body. Microbiomes are essential players of biotechnological applications, and their functions drive human, animal, plant and environmental health. The rapidly developing microbiome research landscape was studied by a global mapping ex...

Abstract The field of microbiome research has evolved rapidly over the past few decades and has become a topic of great scientific and public interest. As a result of this rapid growth in interest covering different fields, we are lacking a clear commonly agreed definition of the term “microbiome.” Moreover, a consensus on best practices in microbi...

Microbiome research has consistently been placed in the spotlight over the past two decades, and has shown tremendous promise in the fields of medicine, environmental science, food production, and agriculture. Life on Earth does not exist without microbes, and we may benefit from learning more about them. Yet, there is no common understanding among...

Tripartite interactions among insect vectors, midgut bacteria, and viruses may determine the ability of insects to transmit pathogenic arboviruses. Here, we investigated the impact of gut bacteria on the susceptibility of Culicoides nubeculosus and Culicoides sonorensis biting midges for Schmallenberg virus, and of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes for Zika...

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via the original article.

Soil microbial communities interact with roots, affecting plant growth and nutrient acquisition. In the present study, we aimed to decipher the effects of the inoculants Trichoderma harzianum T-22, Pseudomonas sp. DSMZ 13134, Bacillus amyloliquefaciens FZB42 or Pseudomonas sp. RU47 on the rhizosphere microbial community and their beneficial effects...

Er gaat geen week voorbij, of er staat iets over micro-organismen in de krant: nieuwe infectieziektes, ziekenhuis met resistente bacteriën, de rol van darmflora op het ontstaan van obesitas in muizen. Ook de technologie om micro-organismen en hun complexe levensgemeenschappen in kaart te brengen maakt een snelle ontwikkeling door. Daarnaast zijn de...

Animal manure from intensive livestock farming is spread on arable fields and grassland on a large scale in the Netherlands. This manure can contain residues of veterinary medicines that have been given to livestock. Some of these substances are increasingly found in groundwater and surface water. Policymakers and soil and water managers would ther...

De toepassing van drijfmest op akkers en grasland kan leiden tot verspreiding van diergeneesmiddelen naar bodem, grondwater en oppervlaktewater. Voor de 20 meest gebruikte antibiotica en antiparasitica in twee Nederlandse veehouderijsectoren, de intensieve varkens- en de kalverhouderij, hebben wij gebruiksgegevens en stofeigenschappen verzameld, zo...

A field experiment was conducted to compare effects of four types of organic amendments on soil chemical, microbiological and disease suppression characteristics in an organic farm. The amendments were plant-derived fresh compost (C), steer-derived slurry (S), slurry plus dung (SD) and slurry, compost and dung (SCD). We hypothesized that amendments...

Onder bepaalde omstandigheden, zoals behandelingen met verschillende soorten organische stof, zijn bodems weerbaarder tegen Rhizoctonia solani. De vraag is wat het mechanisme achter deze verhoogde weerbaarheid is en de hypothese van de onderzoekers is dat de levende fractie van de bodem hier voor verantwoordelijk is.

The early 1970s witnessed a major breakthrough in molecular biology with the discovery of restriction enzymes. From that moment on, it has been possible to modify the genetic constitution of all organisms, and a new era in human history started. In the early years of genetic modification, the perspectives of these approaches were tremendous. Howeve...