News • Magnetic tentacle
A small robot to explore the lungs
A proof of concept for a robot that can reach some of the smallest bronchial tubes in the lungs to take tissue samples or deliver cancer therapy.
Lung
News • Alternative to injection
Inhaled vaccine delivers broad protection against SARS-CoV-2
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.
News • Heart failure and organ fibrosis
RNA therapeutics: potential far beyond Covid-19
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.
News • Blood clot screening
AI could help detect pulmonary embolisms with ECG data
A new pilot study suggests that machine learning algorithms which fuse electrocardiogram (ECG) and electronic health record data may help doctors screen for dangerous, lung-clogging blot clots.
Article • Assessing infection severity
CT score predicts Covid-19 death risk
Radiologists in Paris have developed a standardised simple visual lung damage CT severity score for Covid-19 patients who do not have symptoms of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) at the time of initial treatment.
News • Life-saving treatment
First double-lung transplant after Covid-19 performed in Portugal
Doctors in Lisbon report on the case of a 61-year-old man who received a double lung transplant after his lungs were irreparably damaged by Covid-19.
Article • Remote patient monitoring
Wearables must demonstrate efficacy in respiratory care
Wearables are a trend in respiratory care and many products are being developed to monitor patients remotely. But how much can these tools really help clinicians? An Italian expert discussed current solutions and challenges to their development.
News • Coronavirus imaging
Brightest ever X-ray shows lung damage from Covid-19
The damage caused by Covid-19 to the lungs’ smallest blood vessels has been intricately captured using high-energy X-rays emitted by a special type of particle accelerator. Scientists used a new imaging technology called Hierarchical Phase-Contrast Tomography (HiP-CT), to scan donated human organs, including lungs from a Covid-19 donor.
News • Immunological memory
How our lungs 'remember' a Covid-19 infection
After infection with SARS-CoV-2, where does the immune system store the memory to provide long-term protection against reinfection? Though numerous studies have examined blood to track immune responses to SARS-CoV-2, a new study of Covid survivors shows that the memory of the infection is primarily stored in T and B cells within the lung and the lymph nodes surrounding the lung.
News • Respiratory research
Covid-19 infection does not affect lung function in kids, young adults
Covid-19 infection does not appear to affect the lung function of young adults, according to new research presented at the ‘virtual’ European Respiratory Society International Congress. In the first study to investigate the impact of Covid-19 infection on lung function, researchers led by Dr Ida Mogensen, a post-doctoral fellow at the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden, found that even…
News • Revealed in CT scans
Lung damage: New cause for breathing troubles in asthmatics found
A novel CT scan-based approach has revealed significant changes in a parameter indicating lung destruction in some asthmatics. This finding could lead to more personalized treatments for asthma accompanied by persistent airflow limitation. Clinicians have long thought that some people with asthma experience declines in their lung function, called fixed airflow obstruction (FAO), due to changes to…
News • Infection research
Understanding lung damage in Covid-19 patients
Covid-19 disease severity is determined by the individual patient’s immune response. The precise mechanisms taking place inside the lungs and blood during the early phase of the disease, however, remain unclear. Researchers from Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) and Freie Universität Berlin have now studied the cellular mechanisms…
News • Preventing long-term damage
How Covid-19 attacks lung tissues
La Trobe University researchers are the first in the world to characterize precisely how Covid-19 attacks lung tissues — an important step in preventing long-term damage.
News • Severe effects
How COVID-19 wreaks havoc on human lungs
Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory have published the first detailed atomic-level model of the SARS-CoV-2 "envelope" protein bound to a human protein essential for maintaining the lining of the lungs.
News • „Swarm Learning“
AI with swarm intelligence to analyse medical data
Communities benefit from sharing knowledge and experience among their members. Following a similar principle - called “swarm learning” - an international research team has trained artificial intelligence algorithms to detect blood cancer, lung diseases and Covid-19 in data stored in a decentralized fashion. This approach has advantage over conventional methods since it inherently provides…
News • Radiology research
Chest CT illuminates COPD mortality risk
Body composition information derived from routine chest CTs can provide important information on the overall health of people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), including their risk of all-cause mortality. This is the result of a new study, published in Radiology. COPD is a group of chronic, progressive lung diseases that affect about 30 million people in the United States alone.…
News • Chest CT workflow optimisation
AI-powered Covid-19 solution reduces report turnaround time by 30%
The results of a large-scale study indicate that the introduction of an AI-powered solution by healthcare software company Radlogics into radiology workflow to analyze Chest-CT scans during the Covid-19 pandemic reduced report turnaround time by an average of 30 percent, which is equivalent to 7 minutes per case.
Sponsored • Wako β-glucan test
Better detection and diagnosis of fungal infections
Beta-glucan tests are proving to be pivotal in the better detection and diagnosis of fungal infections. As a robust complimentary test for traditional testing techniques and biomarkers, it is helping clinicians deliver rapid results and offering greater reassurance in more accurately identifying such infections. β-glucan testing, which is an in vitro diagnostic test, is regularly used at…
News • Research collaboration
'Cells of the future' might cure lung infections
Healing the body with cells – this is the ambitious goal of scientists at Hannover Medical School (MHH). With this in mind, Professor Dr. Nico Lachmann and Dr. Robert Zweigerdt have initiated a research collaboration and license agreement with the pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk A/S, to combine academic knowhow with the translational power of the industry. The overall aim of the endeavor is…
News • Fight against COVID-19
AI lung scan analysis rolled out across Europe
The Belgian initiative icovid, which supports radiologists in the assessment of CT images of the lungs of COVID-19 patients, has grown into a multicentre European project, co-funded by the EU Horizon 2020 programme. Icovid was set up in March by UZ Brussel, KU Leuven, icometrix and ETRO, an imec research group of VUB.
News • Intensive care
Protecting lungs from ventilation-induced injury
An unfortunate truth about the use of mechanical ventilation to save the lives of patients in respiratory distress is that the pressure used to inflate the lungs is likely to cause further lung damage. In a new study, scientists identified a molecule that is produced by immune cells during mechanical ventilation to try to decrease inflammation, but isn’t able to completely prevent…
News • Lasts longer, causes more damage
Covid-19 pneumonia: not your typical garden-variety pneumonia
Bacteria or viruses like influenza that cause pneumonia can spread across large regions of the lung within hours. In the modern intensive care unit, these bacteria or viruses are usually controlled either by antibiotics or by the body’s immune system within the first few days of the illness. But in a study published in Nature, investigators at Northwestern Medicine show Covid-19 pneumonia is…
News • Dangerous immune response
New insight on severe virus attacks on the lungs
In some cases, immune cells in the lungs can contribute to worsening a virus attack. In a new study, researchers at Karolinska Institutet describe how different kinds of immune cells, called macrophages, develop in the lungs and which of them may be behind severe lung diseases. The study, which was published in Immunity, may contribute to future treatments for Covid-19, among other diseases.
Article • Coronavirus imaging
Covid-19: Is CT more sensitive than PCR testing?
Covid-19 causes characteristic changes in lung tissue visible in CT scans and chest radiographs, known as “ground-glass” opacities. Imaging is now considered a valid alternative, possibly even superior to RT-PCR. ‘This sparked an international debate about the role of CT in the diagnostic work-up of Covid-19,’ said radiologist Professor Cornelia Schäfer-Prokop.
Article • The role of chest CT in diagnosis and treatment
UPDATE: Covid-19 and lung infections imaging
RSNA 2020: International experts showcased new studies on chest CT’s role in Covid-19 diagnosis and treatment. A staggering volume of work and has been produced on the pandemic this year, with an average 367 Covid-19 journal articles published per week, according to Michael Chung, Assistant professor of radiology at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NYC.