How do the three large protein complexes – the ribosome, the SKI complex and the exosome – interact? A team of scientists led by Elena Conti reveals this question in their current study.
People who have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19 have a significantly lower risk of developing more severe cardiovascular conditions linked to Covid-19 infection, a new study shows.
Brazilian researchers have identified a key mechanism of Sars-CoV-2 to manipulate its host’s immune defense. This discovery could pave the way for the development of novel therapies.
Endometriosis can cause abdominal pain and cramping before, during and after menstruation, and may lead to infertility. Now, researchers identified promising approaches for better early diagnosis.
A new study shows that extracellular vesicles shed by prostate cancer cells contain tumor-derived material that can be used as biomarkers of therapy response and resistance in metastatic disease.
Digital pathology can be used to great effect in pharmaceutical research: it can accelerate analyses, give deeper insights into cellular mechanisms, and enable better understanding of their role into clinical development. This potentially offers clearer predictions on how patients may respond to treatment and lead to personalized therapies.
New study results explore the long-term effects of infection with Sars-CoV-2, and challenge the idea that vaccine immunity fades quickly.
Coronavirus vaccines have showcased the possibilities of messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. Now, a research team aims to put it to use against a rare inherited metabolic disorder.
In a new study, researchers from Fudan University have developed a novel urine-based prognostic model that promises to transform the management and treatment of bladder cancer.
For their contributions to developing mRNA vaccines to fight Covid-19, Katalin Karikó, PhD, and Drew Weissman, MD, PhD, have been jointly awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
A new onco-therapeutic vaccine candidate against human papillomavirus (HPV)-induced cancers, such as cervical and oropharyngeal cancers, has shown promising results in the preclinical phase.
Patients with immunodeficiency cannot benefit from conventional Covid-19 vaccines and still at risk from infection. A promising new approach now brings hope for this patient group.
Researchers in France identified changes to the immune memory after infection with the Omicron BA.1 variant in thrice-vaccinated patients. The remodeling actually works to the patients' benefit.
Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have developed a molecular method able to detect whether or not bacteria respond to antibiotics within minutes.
Protection offered by Covid-19 vaccination declines more rapidly in people with severe obesity than in those with normal weight, scientists at the Universities of Cambridge and Edinburgh have found.
A new class of immunotherapy shows promising results for fighting the most aggressive form of skin cancer.
Getting vaccines to people who need them isn't always easy. Many vaccines require cold storage, making it difficult to ship them to remote areas that don't have the necessary infrastructure.
Messenger Ribonucleic Acid (mRNA) as a therapeutic approach is gaining momentum due to its ability to be rapidly manufactured and its promising outcomes.
A novel imaging agent can reduce the number of false-positive PET/CT findings among cancer patients recently vaccinated for Covid-19. This may mitigate the issue of tracer uptake in lymph nodes associaed with the vaccine.
At this year's Medica tradefair, laboratory medicine, medical technology and life sciences give new impulses to the entire healthcare market - especially in times of the corona pandemic. An overview.
A study in Japan finds antibody response to the Moderna Covid-19 mRNA vaccine does not vary depending on the time of day when the dose was received.
The overall risk of myocarditis is substantially higher immediately after being infected with Covid-19 than it is in the weeks following vaccination for the coronavirus, a large new study shows.
The new test measures the level of neutralizing antibodies in a blood sample and could help people decide what protections they should take against infection.
Researchers propose a new Covid-19 vaccine that specifically instructs the immune system to produce T-cells rather than antibodies - a promising alternative for people with a weakened immune system.
A method for delivering genetic material to the body that has proven useful in Covid-19 vaccination is now being tested as a way to repair damaged heart muscle after a heart attack.
By comparing the infectious viral load caused by ancestral SARS-CoV-2 as well as by the Delta and Omicron variants, scientists highlight the benefits of vaccination.
An ECRC research team has introduced CRISPR-Cas9 into human muscle stem cells for the first time using mRNA, thus discovering a method suitable for therapeutic applications.
Scientists have confirmed that an inhaled form of COVID vaccine can provide broad, long-lasting protection against the original strain of SARS-CoV-2 and variants of concern.
RNA has already been making an impact in the context of the vaccine program, but the potential of RNA-based compounds is far from being fully tapped, as RNA allows for entirely new therapeutic approaches.
A new biopsy tool will enable scientists and clinicians to simultaneously profile many biomarkers in cells and tissues.
An international team of scientists have identified antibodies that neutralize omicron and other SARS-CoV-2 variants.
Hope for a future without fear of Covid-19 comes down to circulating antibodies and memory B cells. Unlike circulating antibodies, which peak soon after vaccination or infection only to fade a few months later, memory B cells can stick around to prevent severe disease for decades. And they evolve over time, learning to produce successively more potent “memory antibodies” that are better at…
Researchers in Thailand have developed a device to get the most out of vaccine supplies: The automated vaccine filling machine from the Faculty of Engineering at Chulalongkorn University can fill AstraZeneca vaccine into syringes with precision, speed, and safety, helping to increase the number of vaccinated people by 20 percent. The prototype is now operating at Chula Vaccination Center and more…
Researchers from the University of Oxford have announced the results of a study into thrombocytopenia (a condition with low platelet counts) and thromboembolic events (blood clots) following vaccination for Covid-19, some of the same events which have led to restricted use of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine in a number of countries.
Nanocontainers can transport substances into cells where they can then take effect. This is the method used in, for example, the mRNA vaccines currently being employed against Covid-19 as well as certain cancer drugs. In research, similar transporters can also be used to deliver labelled substances into cells in order to study basic cellular functions. To take advantage of their full potential,…
A novel study published in AACC’s The Journal of Applied Laboratory Medicine shows that delaying the second Covid-19 vaccine dose for more than the recommended 3-4 weeks results in higher antibody levels. This finding could play a vital role in shaping vaccine distribution strategies that increase access to the vaccine around the globe.
In view of the continuing high numbers of infections, vaccination offers important protection against severe Covid-19 disease. Scientists from the Faculty of Medicine – University of Freiburg have now been able to determine in detail at what time point initial immune protection is established after vaccination with an mRNA-based vaccine and how the reactions of the various components of the…
Researchers at the University of Oxford report that the risk of the rare blood clotting known as cerebral venous thrombosis (CVT) following Covid-19 infection is around 100 times greater than normal, several times higher than it is post-vaccination or following influenza. The study authors, led by Professor Paul Harrison and Dr Maxime Taquet from Oxford University’s Department of Psychiatry and…
In the largest study of its kind to date, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard have found the new mRNA Covid-19 vaccines to be highly effective in producing antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus in pregnant and lactating women. They also demonstrated the vaccines confer protective immunity to newborns…
With two commercially available inhibitors, the cell cycle of the cancer cells in neuroblastomas can be disrupted at a key point causing tumour cell death. Neuroblastomas are malignant solid tumours that occur mainly in early childhood. Inhibiting the MYCN oncogene or its function could be a promising therapeutic opportunity.
This FAQ from the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology is provided to help answer patient questions about COVID-19 vaccines. These recommendations are based on best knowledge to date, but could change at any time, pending new information and further guidance from the FDA or CDC.
As the first coronavirus vaccines started to be rolled out at the end of a tumultuous 2020, UK officials unexpectedly endorsed stretching the gap between the first and second vaccine dose by up to three months – an approach also considered by other countries.
Scientists have known for years that mutations in the MLL4 gene can cause Kabuki syndrome, a rare developmental disorder. How exactly this happens remeained a mystery for long. Now, a new study illuminates new details. The research suggests that MLL4 controls the production of neurons that secrete growth hormone-releasing hormone (GHRH) in a part of the brain called the hypothalamus. Mice without…
Even those who understand the scientific process, trust medical experts and know how important vaccines are for fighting infectious diseases might still have some questions or concerns about the new Covid-19 vaccines. Here, Thaddeus Stappenbeck, MD, PhD, helps set the record straight on 8 common questions, concerns and myths that have emerged about Covid-19 vaccines.
Before the pandemic, the lab of Stanford University biochemist Peter S. Kim focused on developing vaccines for HIV, Ebola and pandemic influenza. But, within days of closing their campus lab space as part of Covid-19 precautions, they turned their attention to a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. Although the coronavirus was outside the lab’s specific area of expertise,…
Researchers at Tel Aviv University (TAU) have demonstrated that the CRISPR/Cas9 system is very effective in treating metastatic cancers, a significant step on the way to finding a cure for cancer.
Although its name is relatively unspecific and indeed opaque, the Nonstructural Protein 1 (Nsp1) encoded by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which is responsible for the current pandemic, has now been shown to have a devastating effect on host cells. Nsp1 is in fact one of the central weapons used by the virus to ensure its own replication and propagation in human hosts. Nsp1 was identified as a…
Chronic inflammatory diseases, such as allergies and asthma, are not only an acute problem but also a major research and prevention challenge. We spoke with Professor Harald Renz, Director of the Institute for Laboratory Medicine at the University Hospital Gießen/Marburg, Germany, and discussed the major reason for increases in the number of these widespread diseases.
Measuring tumour infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) is gaining importance in immunotherapy, but other variables must also be considered to boost prognosis and prediction accuracy, a leading pathologist argued at EBCC 11 last March in Barcelona. When it comes to prognosis and prediction for immunotherapy, a potentially new variable is emerging – TILs – white blood cells that have left the blood…
The prospect of an actively personalized approach to the treatment of glioblastoma has moved a step closer with the recent publication in Nature of favorable data from the phase 1 study GAPVAC-101, testing a novel therapeutic concept tailored to specific characteristics of patients’ individual tumors and immune systems. For the first time, the feasibility of such a highly personalized form of…
Taking a biopsy of a brain tumor is a complicated and invasive surgical process, but a team of researchers at Washington University in St. Louis is developing a way that allows them to detect tumor biomarkers through a simple blood test. Hong Chen, a biomedical engineer, and Eric C. Leuthardt, MD, a neurosurgeon, led a team of engineers, physicians and researchers who have developed a…
Bio-Rad Laboratories announces the launch of the "QXDx BCR-ABL %IS" Kit, the first CE-IVD digital PCR test that can monitor the molecular response of patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) to therapy.
Scientists are using their increasing knowledge of the complex interaction between cancer and the immune system to engineer increasingly potent anti-cancer vaccines. Now researchers at the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB) have developed a synergistic nanovaccine packing DNA and RNA sequences that modulate the immune response, along with anti-tumor antigens, into…
A group of researchers, lead by Vasily M. Studitsky, professor at the Lomonosov Moscow State University, discovered a new mechanism of DNA repair, which opens up new perspectives for the treatment and prevention of neurodegenerative diseases. The article describing their discovery is published in AAAS' first open access online-only journal Science Advances.
Working independently from different perspectives, geneticists from Finland and biochemists from Würzburg have researched the molecular mechanisms of schizophrenia and cognitive impairment.
Detection of circulating and disseminated tumour cells in blood is a promising method to diagnose cancer dissemination, or to follow up cancer patients during therapy. Today’s methods and involve time-consuming (more than a day) sample processing and cell isolation steps -- all labour intensive and expensive. A lab-on-chip that could integrate those processing steps would enable faster,…
Current cervical cancer screening is time consuming and expensive, but now new breakthrough technology developed by European researchers should allow large-range screening by non-medical personnel with almost immediate results and at a much lower cost.
t the Engineering in Medicine and Biology Conference (EMBC) in Buenos Aires (Argentina), imec and its project partners announce the launch of the European Seventh Framework Project MIRACLE. The MIRACLE project aims at developing an operational lab-on-chip for the isolation and detection of circulating and disseminated tumor cells (CTCs and DTCs) in blood. The new lab-on-chip is an essential step…
A study published online today in the journal Genome Research offers surprising new clues into the genomic complexity of the giant Mimivirus, the largest known virus in the world. Previous studies have shown that unlike most viruses, the Mimivirus has more genes than many bacteria and performs functions that normally occur only in cellular organisms. The results of the most recent study, led by a…
Colorectal cancer occurs in approximately one in every 17 people during their lifetime and is the second leading cause of cancer death in Europe. Two new blood tests could aid in the early identification of patients with gastrointestinal (GI) cancers. The tests will make GI cancer detection simpler, cost-effective, and more acceptable to patients than current methods, the researchers say.
Since the completion of the 13-year human genome project in 2003, molecular scientists have been delving deeper into the world of cells.
Experts starts to identify nutrition's components that might support the fight against diseases. Recently researchers from John Hopkins Medical School found that a decrease in lung concentrations of NFR2-dependent antioxidants, key components of the lung's defense system, is linked to the severity of chronic obstructive pulmany disease (COPD) in smokers.
The discovery of small RNA molecules and their relevance for gene regulation has dramatically changed our understanding of many essential cellular processes — and provides the opportunity to develop new ways for treating various diseases. By selectively inhibiting gene expression and thereby “silencing” genes involved in pathogenesis, the RNA molecules constitute a unique tool to treat…