Unexpected new insights into how COVID-19 infects cells may help explain why coronaviruses are so good at jumping from species to species and will help scientists better predict how COVID-19 will evolve.
Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center have identified a novel parameter of T cells that could help oncologists anticipate which patients would be most likely to develop immunotherapy toxicity. The findings, published in the Journal for ImmunoTherapy of Cancer, could lead to improved treatments for a variety of cancers.
Patients with the genetic disorder hemophilia A receive factor VIII protein replacement treatments to replenish this clotting protein in their blood, thus preventing dangerous bleeding. Unfortunately, about 30 percent of these patients develop antibodies against the treatment and until now, despite more than 80 years of clinical experience with this complication, little has been known about its mechanism.
Penile squamous cell carcinoma is a rare form of penile cancer with limited treatment options. An international study led by Yale Cancer Center researchers at Yale School of Medicine finds that the use of immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) offers promising clinical benefits for some patients with advanced penile squamous cell carcinoma.
What causes long COVID? More than three years after the start of the pandemic, this remains the most bedeviling question about a mystifying syndrome estimated to affect some 65 million people globally — an epidemic in its own right with no clear end in sight.
A collaborative study undertaken by the Navarrabiomed Biomedical Research Center (Pamplona, Navarre), the Institute of Neurosciences CSIC-UMH (Sant Joan d’Alacant, Valencian Community) and IRB Barcelona (Barcelona, Catalonia) shows that the administration of ranolazine, a drug currently used to treat heart conditions, improves the efficacy of current therapies for melanoma, in mouse models of this disease.
The new observation, made by UNC School of Medicine’s Stephan Moll, MD, and Jacquelyn Baskin-Miller, MD, suggests that a life-threatening blood clotting disorder can be caused by an infection with adenovirus, one of the most common respiratory viruses in pediatric and adult patients.
The study, led by scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI), reveals the inner workings of viral factories, clusters of viral proteins and genomes that form in host cells.
Deep-learning technology developed by a team of Johns Hopkins engineers and cancer researchers can accurately predict cancer-related protein fragments that may trigger an immune system response. If validated in clinical trials, the technology could help scientists overcome a major hurdle to developing personalized immunotherapies and vaccines.
The Wistar Institute is pleased to announce the appointment of Alexander Price, Ph.D., as assistant professor in the Gene Expression and Regulation Program of the Ellen and Ronald Caplan Cancer Center at The Wistar Institute.
Certain sugars naturally found in breastmilk could help prevent infections before a baby arrives. Researchers reporting in ACS Central Science have found that these sugars can stop a common prenatal infection in human tissues and pregnant mice.
In their continuing work to limit the impact of COVID-19, Emory University researchers have, for the first time in nonhuman primates, studied how modulating the signaling of type 1 Interferon (IFN-I), one of the body’s initial defenses against infection, impacts SARS-CoV-2 viral replication and disease progression.
The Wistar Institute, a global leader in biomedical research in cancer, immunology and infectious disease, is pleased to welcome Joy Taylor to its Board of Trustees. Taylor is CEO of EastEdge Consulting Services, a Pennsylvania-based management consulting firm focused on organizational and operational improvement.
Intensive production can cause immunological stress in commercial broilers, leading to growth retardation and intestinal damage. In this study, multi-omics analyses reveal that chlorogenic acid (CGA) improves the growth performance, intestinal barrier function and immune function of dexamethasone-treated immunologically-stressed broilers by regulating gut microbiota, gut microbiota metabolites and jejunal proteins.
For the first time in Thailand, lecturers at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences have successfully developed antibody from tobacco plants with inhibitory effects on the growth of cancer cells in laboratory animals. This signals hope for access to effective cancer medication and treatment at a lower cost.
Herpes viruses are treacherous: once you are infected, you can never get rid of the virus. This is because herpes viruses lie dormant in certain host cells in the body for a lifetime.
UNC School of Medicine researchers Angela Wahl, PhD, Balfour Sartor MD, J. Victor Garcia, PhD, and colleagues created a germ-free mouse model to evaluate the role of the microbiome in the infection, replication, and pathogenesis of HIV and the Epstein-Barr virus, the virus that can cause mononucleosis and other serious diseases.
A signaling protein known as STING is a critical player in the human immune system, detecting signs of danger within cells and then activating a variety of defense mechanisms.
Children raised in rural environments who spend a lot of time outdoors with some exposure to animals grow to have better regulated immune systems than children living in urban environments, a new study has found.
Cleveland Clinic researchers have found that starting peanut oral immunotherapy under medical supervision during infancy can improve a child’s immune response to the food over time. The findings were recently published in the Journal of Allergy & Clinical Immunology: In Practice.
Viruses often mutate or hide themselves within cells. But by mimicking the way the immune system naturally deals with invaders, researchers reporting in ACS Infectious Diseases have developed a “peptoid” antiviral therapy that effectively inactivates three viruses in lab tests.
Which types of personalities were more hesitant about COVID-19 vaccination during the pandemic’s peak? Extroverts — according to a new study on more than 40,000 Canadians.
CAR-T immune therapies could be effective against solid tumors if the right targets are identified, a new study led by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researchers suggests. The researchers successfully deployed CAR-T in a mouse model of ovarian cancer, a type of aggressive, solid-tumor cancer that has eluded such therapies until now.
Allergies and asthma can significantly impact a child's well-being and academic performance, but with proper preparation and management, they can thrive in the school environment.
The coronavirus pandemic is no longer a national emergency, but the virus that causes COVID-19 isn’t gone—and neither is the risk of getting the disease. For parents, navigating when to get their child vaccinated and knowing how to best protect their child from COVID-19 can be complicated. We spoke to Michael Smit, MD, MSPH, Hospital Epidemiologist and Medical Director of Infection Prevention and Control at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, to get an update on the latest COVID-19 vaccine information and precautions.
University of Illinois scientists have identified a protein that plays a critical role in the action of several emerging cancer therapies. The discovery will likely aid efforts to fine-tune the use of immunotherapies against several challenging cancers.
A mammalian protein previously shown by UT Southwestern microbiologists to inhibit the virus that causes COVID-19 in cell culture also protected live mouse models, significantly limiting infection in the lung cells and diminishing the symptoms. The findings, published in Nature Microbiology, could lead to new strategies to treat COVID-19, which still infects thousands and kills hundreds in the U.S. every week.
A metabolic by-product that is more prevalent during fasting may supercharge immune cells as they fight infection and disease, reports an early stage study by Van Andel Institute scientists and collaborators.
Support for early career researchers is about to get a major boost, thanks to a new fellowship fund established by leaders at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) and Japan-based global pharmaceutical corporation, Kyowa Kirin, Inc.
Immune-checkpoint inhibitors have become the standard of care for patients with advanced melanoma to improve survival, but only some patients respond to this immunotherapy and have long-term benefits. The lack of a long-lasting response, researchers say, is related to failure of antitumor immunologic memory. Treatment options for advanced melanoma are limited for patients who do not respond to this type of therapy.
Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cells are a powerful, new form of cancer therapy that are being studied to treat blood cancers. Using a new approach, Yale Cancer Center researchers at Yale School of Medicine found a new way to substantially improve the effectiveness of CAR-T cell therapy. The new study was published in Nature Immunology on July 27.
New research in colorectal cancers directed by investigators at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center suggests that expression of transcription factors — proteins that help turn specific genes on or off by binding to nearby DNA — may play a central role in the degree of DNA methylation across the genome, contributing to the development of different subtypes of these cancers. Methylation is a process in which certain chemical groups attach to areas of DNA that guide genes’ on/off switches.
Investigators at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have designed an innovative RNA-based strategy to activate dendritic cells—which play a key role in immune response—that eradicated tumors and prevented their recurrence in mouse models of melanoma.
In a new study, scientists at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) compared the immune response of individuals who received older versus newer versions of the whooping cough vaccine. The unexpected findings may help explain the recent rise in whooping cough cases and point to potential targets for the next generation of vaccines.
Immune system researchers have designed a computational tool to boost pandemic preparedness. Scientists can use this new algorithm to compare data from vastly different experiments and better predict how individuals may respond to disease.
A new paper in Biology Methods & Protocols, published by Oxford University Press, shows it may be possible to design vaccines that will induce a stronger immune response to infecting pathogens, such as the virus causing COVID-19.
In the largest study of its kind, researchers from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) used electronic health record (EHR) data from more than 200,000 pediatric patients to describe patterns of pediatric allergies across the United States, validating a population-level pattern of allergy development known as the “allergic march,” in which allergies first present as eczema, followed by food allergies, asthma, and environmental allergies. The researchers also found that a rare food allergy called eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE), which has historically been considered a disease affecting primarily White males, is more common among non-White patients than previously reported.
Animals and humans coexist with a vast array of microorganisms known as the microbiome, forming an intricate relationship that can range from mutually beneficial to pathogenic.
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The widespread, pathogenic microbe Staphylococcus aureus can colonize the skin and mucous membranes throughout the body, particularly the vagina and gastrointestinal tract.
A new study, which involved experiments on mice and human patients, uncovered an important communication pathway between two molecules called CEACAM1 (CC1) and TIM-3, finding that the pathway plays a crucial role in controlling the body's immune response during liver transplantation.