In defense of children's brain: reshuffling the laboratory toolbox for the diagnosis of congenital toxoplasmosis.

For decades, an immunosorbent agglutination assay (ISAGA) has been considered the gold standard method for the detection of Toxoplasma gondii-specific IgM in infants for the diagnosis of congenital toxoplasmosis (CT). The Toxoplasma IgM ISAGA was consistently reported as having superior sensitivity. Unfortunately, the commercial kit for the detection of Toxoplasma IgM ISAGA will no longer be available in 2024 and alternatives will only be available at a handful of reference laboratories as in-house or laboratory-developed tests. In a recent study, S. Arkhis, C. Rouges, N. Dahane, H. Guegan, et al. (J Clin Microbiol 62:e01222-23, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1128/jcm.01222-23), reported that the performance of the PLATELIA Toxo IgM was comparable to that of the ISAGA method for the diagnosis of CT. A second study revealing similar results supports the PLATELIA Toxo IgM as the new gold standard for the detection of T. gondii-specific IgM in infants. Although the laboratory toolbox for CT diagnosis has been reshuffled successfully, it is by universally implementing all available serological and molecular tools at the earliest possible time during gestation that we can best defend children's brain from the potential harm caused by trans-placentally transmitted T. gondii.

Asociación entre la adherencia a la dieta mediterránea y las manifestaciones orales auto reportadas en adultos mayores / Association between adherence to the Mediterranean diet and self-reported oral manifestations in older adults

Fundamentos: La Dieta mediterránea (DM) es muy abundante en vitaminas que podrían contribuir al equilibrio en el mantenimiento de la salud cavidad oral. Por ello, es necesario determinar la asociación de la adherencia a la dieta mediterránea con las manifestaciones orales autoreportadas en adultos mayores. Métodos: El diseño del estudio realizado fue observacional de tipo analítico y transversal. Se ejecutó mediante una encuesta de forma virtual en adultos mayores durante el año 2022. Se utilizaron instrumentos validados de adherencia de la DM (MEDAS-14) y un autorreporte sobre manifestaciones orales, además se evaluaron diversas covariables. Para las variables cualitativas se obtuvieron frecuencias relativas y absolutas. En el análisis bivariado se utilizó la prueba estadística Chi-cuadrado. Para la asociación de las variables cualitativas y el cálculo de las razones de prevalencia crudas y ajustadas, se empleó la regresión de Poisson con varianza robusta. Resultado: Se halló que el 90,91% de los encuestados que mantenían una adherencia a la DM alta no manifestaban halitosis. Además, se observó que 57,58% que seguían una dieta mediterránea alta no manifestaba dolor dental. Se encontró en el análisis multivariado asociación estadísticamente significativa entre los encuestados que tenían una adherencia a la DM con ciertas manifestaciones orales tales como presencia de caries dental, dolor dental, halitosis, presencia de sangrado y movilidad dental en los análisis crudo y ajustado. Conclusión: La adherencia a la dieta mediterránea se relaciona a un mejor estado de salud en una población de adultos mayores. (AU)

Background: The Mediterranean Diet is very abundant in vitamins that could contribute to the balance in the maintenance of oral cavity health. Therefore, it is necessary to determine the association of adherence to the Mediterranean diet with self-reported oral manifestations in older adults. Methods: The study design was observational, analytical and cross-sectional. It was carried out through a virtual survey in older adults during the year 2022. Validated instruments of adherence to the Mediterranean diet (MEDAS14) and a self-report on oral manifestations were used, in addition various covariates were evaluated. For the qualitative variables, relative and absolute frequencies were obtained. In the bivariate analysis, the Chi-square statistical test was used. For the association of the qualitative variables and the calculation of the raw and adjusted prevalence ratios, Poisson regression with robust variance was used. Result: It was found that 90.91% of the respondents who maintained a high adherence to the MD did not manifest halitosis. In addition, it was observed that 57.58% who followed a high Mediterranean diet did not manifest dental pain. In the multivariate analysis, a statistically significant association was found between those surveyed who adhered to the MD with certain oral manifestations such as the presence of dental caries, dental pain, halitosis, presence of bleeding, and dental mobility in the crude and adjusted analyzes. (AU)

A Randomized, Double-Blind, Phase 3 Safety and Efficacy Study of Ridinilazole Versus Vancomycin for Treatment of Clostridioides difficile Infection: Clinical Outcomes With Microbiome and Metabolome Correlates of Response.

BACKGROUND: Exposure to antibiotics predisposes to dysbiosis and Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) that can be severe, recurrent (rCDI), and life-threatening. Nonselective drugs that treat CDI and perpetuate dysbiosis are associated with rCDI, in part due to loss of microbiome-derived secondary bile acid (SBA) production. Ridinilazole is a highly selective drug designed to treat CDI and prevent rCDI. METHODS: In this phase 3 superiority trial, adults with CDI, confirmed with a stool toxin test, were randomized to receive 10 days of ridinilazole (200 mg twice daily) or vancomycin (125 mg 4 times daily). The primary endpoint was sustained clinical response (SCR), defined as clinical response and no rCDI through 30 days after end of treatment. Secondary endpoints included rCDI and change in relative abundance of SBAs. RESULTS: Ridinilazole and vancomycin achieved an SCR rate of 73% versus 70.7%, respectively, a treatment difference of 2.2% (95% CI: -4.2%, 8.6%). Ridinilazole resulted in a 53% reduction in recurrence compared with vancomycin (8.1% vs 17.3%; 95% CI: -14.1%, -4.5%; P = .0002). Subgroup analyses revealed consistent ridinilazole benefit for reduction in rCDI across subgroups. Ridinilazole preserved microbiota diversity, increased SBAs, and did not increase the resistome. Conversely, vancomycin worsened CDI-associated dysbiosis, decreased SBAs, increased Proteobacteria abundance (∼3.5-fold), and increased the resistome. CONCLUSIONS: Although ridinilazole did not meet superiority in SCR, ridinilazole greatly reduced rCDI and preserved microbiome diversity and SBAs compared with vancomycin. These findings suggest that treatment of CDI with ridinilazole results in an earlier recovery of gut microbiome health. Clinical Trials Registration.Ri-CoDIFy 1 and 2: NCT03595553 and NCT03595566.

Effect of fortification with CaCO3 nanoparticles obtained from eggshell on the physical and sensory characteristics of three food matrices.

Food fortification has attracted interest in recent years, due to the understanding that micronutrient deficiency is one of the causes of the global burden of disease, and that food fortification aims to prevent or correct a demonstrated deficiency of one or more nutrients in a specific population or population groups. Nutritional value is an important concern regarding fortification and new product development. However, people are not willing to sacrifice the organoleptic characteristics of food products. Therefore, the effect of CaCO3 nanoparticles (NPs-CaCO3) and commercial CaCO3 on the physical and sensory properties of three food matrices (cookies, fruit rolls and dairy desserts) was evaluated. A texture analysis was performed on cookies and fruit rolls; a viscosity analysis on dairy desserts; and a color analysis and sensory profile on the three matrices. The results showed that both types of calcium increase hardness in fortified biscuits and fruit rolls but, in the latter case, commercial calcium caused a higher increase in hardness (p < 0.05). Viscosity was higher in the desserts with NPs. Color presented significant changes in all the fortified matrices. These findings demonstrated that Ca-NPs are a good strategy for food fortification compared to commercial calcium carbonate, as fortification with high levels of calcium is a challenge for the food industry due to its effects on the product. The results showed that, in the matrices with commercial calcium, the changes were more evident, while the matrices fortified with Ca-NP have a better sensory response than commercial Ca, with a higher level of acceptance by the judges. Therefore Ca-NPs can be considered to be a good source of calcium for food product fortification that causes a slight effect on physical and sensory properties.

Imaging biomarkers and radiomics in pediatric oncology: a view from the PRIMAGE (PRedictive In silico Multiscale Analytics to support cancer personalized diaGnosis and prognosis, Empowered by imaging biomarkers) project.

This review paper presents the practical development of imaging biomarkers in the scope of the PRIMAGE (PRedictive In silico Multiscale Analytics to support cancer personalized diaGnosis and prognosis, Empowered by imaging biomarkers) project, as a noninvasive and reliable way to improve the diagnosis and prognosis in pediatric oncology. The PRIMAGE project is a European multi-center research initiative that focuses on developing medical imaging-derived artificial intelligence (AI) solutions designed to enhance overall management and decision-making for two types of pediatric cancer: neuroblastoma and diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma. To allow this, the PRIMAGE project has created an open-cloud platform that combines imaging, clinical, and molecular data together with AI models developed from this data, creating a comprehensive decision support environment for clinicians managing patients with these two cancers. In order to achieve this, a standardized data processing and analysis workflow was implemented to generate robust and reliable predictions for different clinical endpoints. Magnetic resonance (MR) image harmonization and registration was performed as part of the workflow. Subsequently, an automated tool for the detection and segmentation of tumors was trained and internally validated. The Dice similarity coefficient obtained for the independent validation dataset was 0.997, indicating compatibility with the manual segmentation variability. Following this, radiomics and deep features were extracted and correlated with clinical endpoints. Finally, reproducible and relevant imaging quantitative features were integrated with clinical and molecular data to enrich both the predictive models and a set of visual analytics tools, making the PRIMAGE platform a complete clinical decision aid system. In order to ensure the advancement of research in this field and to foster engagement with the wider research community, the PRIMAGE data repository and platform are currently being integrated into the European Federation for Cancer Images (EUCAIM), which is the largest European cancer imaging research infrastructure created to date.

Positive Toxoplasma IgG Serology Is Associated with Increased Overall Mortality - A Propensity Score-Matched Analysis.

Toxoplasma gondii is a prevalent parasitic disease with significant morbidity and mortality in immunocompromised populations. We lack long-term outcomes for latent infections. We aimed to elucidate the relationship between latent T. gondii infection and mortality risk. We queried TriNetX, a international multicenter network, to validate mortality risk differences among patients with positive or negative toxoplasma IgG through propensity score matching (PSM). We excluded patients with toxoplasmosis disease by International Classification of Diseases codes or polymerase chain reaction testing. We found 28,138 patients with available toxoplasma IgG serology. Seropositive patients were older and had a male preponderance. More seropositive patients identified as Hispanic, Latino, or Black persons. Patients who were positive for T. gondii IgG serology were slightly more likely to have underlying heart failure, a transplanted organ or tissue, malignant neoplasms of lymphoid or hematopoietic tissues, and diseases of the nervous system than seronegative controls. After PSM of patients with positive (N = 6,475) and negative (N = 6,475) toxoplasma IgG serologies, toxoplasmosis-positive patients were more likely to have long-term drug use but less likely to suffer from behavioral disorders. The overall PSM 1- and 5-year mortality was higher among patients with a positive toxoplasma IgG serology. The risk of schizophrenia was increased at 5 years. We found a prevalence of toxoplasma IgG positivity of 0.03% during the last 3 years. Latent T. gondii associates with a higher overall mortality risk. The study of social determinants of health and follow-up studies are necessary to corroborate the findings and find possible causal mechanisms.

Construction of multilevel statistical models in health research: Foundations and generalities / Fundamento y generalidades de la construcción de modelos estadísticos multinivel en el ámbito de la investigación en salud

This topic review aims to present a global vision of multilevel analysis models' applicability to health research, explaining its theoretical, methodological, and statistical foundations. We describe the basic steps to build these models and examples of their application according to the data hierarchical structure. It ir worth noticing that before using these models, researchers must have a rationale for needing them, and a statistical evaluation accounting for the variance percentage explained by the observations grouping effect. The requirements to conduct this type of analysis depends on special conditions such as the type of variables, the number of units per level, or the type of hierarchical structure. We conclude that multilevel analysis models are a useful tool to integrate information, considering the complexity of the relationships and interactions involved in most health conditions, including the loss of independence between observation units.

Este trabajo tiene como objetivo presentar una mirada global de la aplicabilidad de los modelos de análisis multinivel en el ámbito de la investigación sanitaria. Ofrece información sobre los fundamentos teóricos, metodológicos y estadísticos y, además, menciona los pasos básicos para la construcción de estos modelos, y da ejemplos de su uso, según la estructura jerárquica de los datos. Cabe resaltar que, antes de utilizar estos modelos, se requiere contar con un soporte teórico sobre la necesidad de uso y una valoración estadística que dé cuenta del porcentaje de varianza explicada por el efecto de agrupación de las observaciones. Los requisitos para llevar a cabo este tipo de análisis dependen de condiciones especiales como el tipo de variables, la cantidad de unidades por nivel o el tipo de estructura jerárquica. Se concluye que los modelos de análisis multinivel son una herramienta útil para lograr la integración de información, dadas la complejidad de las relaciones y las interacciones que determinan la mayoría de las condiciones de salud, incluida la pérdida de independencia entre las unidades de observación.

Fundamento y generalidades de la construcción de modelos estadísticos multinivel en el ámbito de la investigación en salud

Este trabajo tiene como objetivo presentar una mirada global de la aplicabilidad de los modelos de análisis multinivel en el ámbito de la investigación sanitaria. Ofrece información sobre los fundamentos teóricos, metodológicos y estadísticos y, además, menciona los pasos básicos para la construcción de estos modelos, y da ejemplos de su uso, según la estructura jerárquica de los datos. Cabe resaltar que, antes de utilizar estos modelos, se requiere contar con un soporte teórico sobre la necesidad de uso y una valoración estadística que dé cuenta del porcentaje de varianza explicada por el efecto de agrupación de las observaciones. Los requisitos para llevar a cabo este tipo de análisis dependen de condiciones especiales como el tipo de variables, la cantidad de unidades por nivel o el tipo de estructura jerárquica. Se concluye que los modelos de análisis multinivel son una herramienta útil para lograr la integración de información, dadas la complejidad de las relaciones y las interacciones que determinan la mayoría de las condiciones de salud, incluida la pérdida de independencia entre las unidades de observación.

This topic review aims to present a global vision of multilevel analysis models' applicability to health research, explaining its theoretical, methodological, and statistical foundations. We describe the basic steps to build these models and examples of their application according to the data hierarchical structure. It ir worth noticing that before using these models, researchers must have a rationale for needing them, and a statistical evaluation accounting for the variance percentage explained by the observations grouping effect. The requirements to conduct this type of analysis depends on special conditions such as the type of variables, the number of units per level, or the type of hierarchical structure. We conclude that multilevel analysis models are a useful tool to integrate information, considering the complexity of the relationships and interactions involved in most health conditions, including the loss of independence between observation units.

Global and cell type-specific immunological hallmarks of severe dengue progression identified via a systems immunology approach.

Severe dengue (SD) is a major cause of morbidity and mortality. To define dengue virus (DENV) target cells and immunological hallmarks of SD progression in children's blood, we integrated two single-cell approaches capturing cellular and viral elements: virus-inclusive single-cell RNA sequencing (viscRNA-Seq 2) and targeted proteomics with secretome analysis and functional assays. Beyond myeloid cells, in natural infection, B cells harbor replicating DENV capable of infecting permissive cells. Alterations in cell type abundance, gene and protein expression and secretion as well as cell-cell communications point towards increased immune cell migration and inflammation in SD progressors. Concurrently, antigen-presenting cells from SD progressors demonstrate intact uptake yet impaired interferon response and antigen processing and presentation signatures, which are partly modulated by DENV. Increased activation, regulation and exhaustion of effector responses and expansion of HLA-DR-expressing adaptive-like NK cells also characterize SD progressors. These findings reveal DENV target cells in human blood and provide insight into SD pathogenesis beyond antibody-mediated enhancement.

Host phylogeny shapes viral transmission networks in an island ecosystem.

Virus transmission between host species underpins disease emergence. Both host phylogenetic relatedness and aspects of their ecology, such as species interactions and predator-prey relationships, may govern rates and patterns of cross-species virus transmission and hence zoonotic risk. To address the impact of host phylogeny and ecology on virus diversity and evolution, we characterized the virome structure of a relatively isolated island ecological community in Fiordland, New Zealand, that are linked through a food web. We show that phylogenetic barriers that inhibited cross-species virus transmission occurred at the level of host phyla (between the Chordata, Arthropoda and Streptophyta) as well as at lower taxonomic levels. By contrast, host ecology, manifest as predator-prey interactions and diet, had a smaller influence on virome composition, especially at higher taxonomic levels. The virus-host community comprised a 'small world' network, in which hosts with a high diversity of viruses were more likely to acquire new viruses, and generalist viruses that infect multiple hosts were more likely to infect additional species compared to host specialist viruses. Such a highly connected ecological community increases the likelihood of cross-species virus transmission, particularly among closely related species, and suggests that host generalist viruses present the greatest risk of disease emergence.

l-Threonine production from whey and fish hydrolysate by E. coli ATCC® 21277TM.

In this work production of l-threonine by Escherichia coli ATCC® 21277™ has been studied using a mixture of alternative low-cost substrates, which are recognized to be a major pollution problem. Whey was used as the primary carbon source, whereas Red Tilapia (Oreochromis sp.) viscera hydrolysates constituted the nitrogen source. A Box-Behnken Design was used for optimizing l-threonine and biomass production, using temperature and glucose, whey, and Red Tilapia (Oreochromis sp.) viscera hydrolysate contents as factors. Results indicate that biomass production is affected by the concentration of hydrolysate and temperature. On the other hand, l-threonine production is affected by concentration of whey, hydrolysate, and temperature. In this context, it was possible to maximize l-threonine production, but with a detriment on biomass production. The optimal conditions for biomass and l-threonine maximization (after 24 h) were identified and validated experimentally, resulting in biomass and l-threonine production of 0.767 g/L and 0.406 g/L, respectively. This work has shown the technical feasibility of using whey and Red Tilapia (Oreochromis sp.) viscera hydrolysates for the production of l-threonine by E. coli ATCC® 21277TM. Finally, the complications associated to the use of these low-cost complex substrates for the production of l-threonine by E. coli, suggest that more in detail studies (i.e. at the metabolic level) are required in order to propose strategies to increase the process productivity, before its scale up. This is a first step in our long-term goal of developing a production process for i) dealing with the pollution problems caused by those wastes, and ii) strengthen the milk and fish industries which are important poles of the Colombian economy.

A multicenter virome analysis of blood, feces, and saliva in myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome.

Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) is estimated to affect 0.4%-2.5% of the global population. Most cases are unexplained; however, some patients describe an antecedent viral infection or response to antiviral medications. We report here a multicenter study for the presence of viral nucleic acid in blood, feces, and saliva of patients with ME/CFS using polymerase chain reaction and high-throughput sequencing. We found no consistent group-specific differences other than a lower prevalence of anelloviruses in cases compared to healthy controls. Our findings suggest that future investigations into viral infections in ME/CFS should focus on adaptive immune responses rather than surveillance for viral gene products.

Molecular timetrees using relaxed clocks and uncertain phylogenies.

A common practice in molecular systematics is to infer phylogeny and then scale it to time by using a relaxed clock method and calibrations. This sequential analysis practice ignores the effect of phylogenetic uncertainty on divergence time estimates and their confidence/credibility intervals. An alternative is to infer phylogeny and times jointly to incorporate phylogenetic errors into molecular dating. We compared the performance of these two alternatives in reconstructing evolutionary timetrees using computer-simulated and empirical datasets. We found sequential and joint analyses to produce similar divergence times and phylogenetic relationships, except for some nodes in particular cases. The joint inference performed better when the phylogeny was not well resolved, situations in which the joint inference should be preferred. However, joint inference can be infeasible for large datasets because available Bayesian methods are computationally burdensome. We present an alternative approach for joint inference that combines the bag of little bootstraps, maximum likelihood, and RelTime approaches for simultaneously inferring evolutionary relationships, divergence times, and confidence intervals, incorporating phylogeny uncertainty. The new method alleviates the high computational burden imposed by Bayesian methods while achieving a similar result.

On near-redundancy and identifiability of parametric hazard regression models under censoring.

We study parametric inference on a rich class of hazard regression models in the presence of right-censoring. Previous literature has reported some inferential challenges, such as multimodal or flat likelihood surfaces, in this class of models for some particular data sets. We formalize the study of these inferential problems by linking them to the concepts of near-redundancy and practical nonidentifiability of parameters. We show that the maximum likelihood estimators of the parameters in this class of models are consistent and asymptotically normal. Thus, the inferential problems in this class of models are related to the finite-sample scenario, where it is difficult to distinguish between the fitted model and a nested nonidentifiable (i.e., parameter-redundant) model. We propose a method for detecting near-redundancy, based on distances between probability distributions. We also employ methods used in other areas for detecting practical nonidentifiability and near-redundancy, including the inspection of the profile likelihood function and the Hessian method. For cases where inferential problems are detected, we discuss alternatives such as using model selection tools to identify simpler models that do not exhibit these inferential problems, increasing the sample size, or extending the follow-up time. We illustrate the performance of the proposed methods through a simulation study. Our simulation study reveals a link between the presence of near-redundancy and practical nonidentifiability. Two illustrative applications using real data, with and without inferential problems, are presented.

Treated and highly diluted, but wastewater still impacts diversity and energy fluxes of freshwater food webs.

Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) have greatly improved water quality globally. However, treated effluents still contain a complex cocktail of pollutants whose environmental effects might go unnoticed, masked by additional stressors in the receiving waters or by spatiotemporal variability. We conducted a BACI (Before-After/Control-Impact) ecosystem manipulation experiment, where we diverted part of the effluent of a large tertiary WWTP into a small, unpolluted stream to assess the effects of a well-treated and highly diluted effluent on riverine diversity and food web dynamics. We sampled basal food resources, benthic invertebrates and fish to search for changes on the structure and energy transfer of the food web with the effluent. Although effluent toxicity was low, it reduced diversity, increased primary production and herbivory, and reduced energy fluxes associated to terrestrial inputs. Altogether, the effluent decreased total energy fluxes in stream food webs, showing that treated wastewater can lead to important ecosystem-level changes, affecting the structure and functioning of stream communities even at high dilution rates. The present study shows that current procedures to treat wastewater can still affect freshwater ecosystems and highlights the need for further efforts to treat polluted waters to conserve aquatic food webs.

Land use drives detritivore size structure and decomposition through shifts in resource quality and quantity.

Land use change and nutrient pollution are two pervasive stressors that can modify carbon cycling, as they influence the inputs and the transformation of detritus. Understanding their impact on stream food webs and on diversity is particularly pressing, as streams are largely fuelled by detrital material received from the adjacent riparian environment. Here we assess how a switch from native deciduous forest to Eucalyptus plantations and nutrient enrichment alter the size distribution of stream detritivore communities and decomposition rates of detritus. As expected, more detritus resulted in higher size-independent, or overall, abundance (i.e. higher intercept of size spectra). This change in overall abundance was mainly driven by a change of the relative contribution of large taxa (Amphipoda and Trichoptera), which changed from an average relative abundance of 55.5 to 77.2 % between the sites compared for resource quantity differences in our study. In contrast, detritus quality modified the relative abundance of large vs small individuals (i.e. size spectra slopes), with shallow slopes of size spectra (proportionately more large individuals) associated with sites with nutrient-richer waters and steeper slopes (proportionately fewer large individuals) associated with sites draining Eucalyptus plantations. Decomposition rates of alder leaves due to macroinvertebrates increased from 0.0003 to 0.0142 when relative contribution of large organisms increased (modelled slopes of size spectra: -1.00 and - 0.33, respectively), highlighting the importance of large sized individuals for ecosystem functioning. Our study reveals that land use change and nutrient pollution can greatly impair the transfer of energy through the detrital or 'brown' food web by means of intra- and inter-specific responses to quality and quantity of the detritus. These responses enable linking land use change and nutrient pollution to ecosystem productivity and carbon cycling.

Thermal mismatches explain consumer-resource dynamics in response to environmental warming.

Changing temperatures will impact food webs in ways we yet to fully understand. The thermal sensitivities of various physiological and ecological processes differ across organisms and study systems, hindering the generation of accurate predictions. One step towards improving this picture is to acquire a mechanistic understanding of how temperature change impacts trophic interactions before we can scale these insights up to food webs and ecosystems. Here, we implement a mechanistic approach centered on the thermal sensitivity of energetic balances in pairwise consumer-resource interactions, measuring the thermal dependence of energetic gain and loss for two resource and one consumer freshwater species. Quantifying the balance between energy gain and loss, we determined the temperature ranges where the balance decreased for each species in isolation (intraspecific thermal mismatch) and where a mismatch in the balance between consumer and resource species emerged (interspecific thermal mismatch). The latter reveals the temperatures for which consumer and resource energetic balances respond either differently or in the same way, which in turn informs us of the strength of top-down control. We found that warming improved the energetic balance for both resources, but reduces it for the consumer, due to the stronger thermal sensitivity of respiration compared to ingestion. The interspecific thermal mismatch yielded different patterns between the two consumer-resource pairs. In one case, the consumer-resource energetic balance became weaker throughout the temperature gradient, and in the other case it produced a U-shaped response. By also measuring interaction strength for these interaction pairs, we demonstrated the correspondence of interspecific thermal mismatches and interaction strength. Our approach accounts for the energetic traits of both consumer and resource species, which combined produce a good indication of the thermal sensitivity of interaction strength. Thus, this novel approach links thermal ecology with parameters typically explored in food-web studies.