Six months of coronavirus: the mysteries scientists are still racing to solve From immunity to the role of genetics, Nature looks at five pressing questions about COVID-19 that researchers are tackling. In late December 2019, reports emerged of a mysterious pneumonia in Wuhan, China, a city of 11 million people in the southeastern province of...
By Dr. Liji Thomas, MD The current COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates the vast unknown of virology, which continues to challenge the ability of humanity to remain healthy when faced with pathogens. While most known microbes have restricted affinity for specific species, continuing to adapt with the host species, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)...
by Babraham Institute A study led by researchers at the Babraham Institute in collaboration with the Wellcome Sanger Institute has uncovered how variations in a non-protein coding ‘dark matter’ region of the genome could make patients susceptible to complex autoimmune and allergic diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease. The study in mice and human cells...
A promising class of drugs known as CD40 monoclonal antibodies could be the spark needed to light the fire in the immune system of patients who don’t respond to the newer cancer immunotherapies. Robert H. Vonderheide, MD, DPhil, director of the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania and an internationally renowned cancer immunotherapy expert, makes...
