THEMATIC ISSUE ON Viable But Non-Culturable Microbes

Editors: Wolfgang Kneifel, Clemens Kittinger

The scope of this issue will focus on the so called viable but non-culturable
(VBNC), microbes that cannot be detected, cultured and enumerated, but are
not necessarily absent. The microcosms of sleeping and resisting cells have
an enormous bandwidth, and many involved factors are unknown.

This phenomenon is an important topic for different areas and disciplines
such as food and water microbiology, medical and clinical microbiology, as
well as environmental microbiology. Hence, viability, detectability, dormant
status, survival, and resuscitation of microbes, as well as their ecology, are
criteria that still challenge the work of microbiologists. With this special
issue in FEMS Microbiology Letters, an attempt is made to generate an
interdisciplinary update of knowledge to this field.

All submitted papers will be subjected to our standard independent peer
review. Authors should specify ‘VBNC 2017’ in the cover letter. Prospective
authors for Mini Reviews or Commentaries must contact the issue’s Editors in
advance. For instructions to authors, please see the
FEMS Microbiology Letters journal page: