Designer peptide could become effective in reducing damage caused by COVID-19 infections UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO – FACULTY OF DENTISTRY TORONTO, ON (June 30, 2020) — A collaboration between the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Dentistry and the National Jewish Health in Denver — the top-ranked respiratory research hospital in the U.S. — has yielded a...
Tag: <span>infections</span>
How the immune system generates a vast antibody repertoire to fight infections
by Research Institute of Molecular Pathology It has long been known that the acquired immune system can generate a vast antibody (immunoglobulin) repertoire by gene recombination in developing B-cells. However, it was not understood how the different immunoglobulin gene segments can meet each other in the three-dimensional space of a B-cell nucleus to undergo recombination,...
WATCH: Drug-resistant superbugs are a slow-moving pandemic
Scientists at McMaster are warning that while the world’s attention is focused on COVID-19, another pandemic — antimicrobial resistance (AMR) — is of grave concern. “AMR is a pandemic that has been going on for a very long time. Essentially, when we started to use antibiotics, we started to see resistance to them,” says Lori...
Research shows COVID-19 is an independent risk factor for acute ischemic stroke
THE MOUNT SINAI HOSPITAL / MOUNT SINAI SCHOOL OF MEDICINE PUNEET BELANI, MD, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, RADIOLOGY AND NEUROSURGERY, ICAHN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AT MOUNT SINAIview more CREDIT: MOUNT SINAI HEALTH SYSTEM Journal Name: American Journal of Neuroradiology: http://www.ajnr.org/content/ajnr/early/2020/06/25/ajnr.A6650.full.pdf Title of the Article: COVID-19 is an independent risk factor for acute ischemic stroke. Corresponding Author: Puneet...
Initial COVID-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported
by Pennsylvania State University Many epidemiologists believe that the initial COVID-19 infection rate was undercounted due to testing issues, asymptomatic and alternatively symptomatic individuals, and a failure to identify early cases. Now, a new study from Penn State estimates that the number of early COVID-19 cases in the U.S. may have been more than 80...
Existing drugs may limit damage caused by HIV
by Yale University Yale researchers have identified four drugs that may help minimize the long-term health effects of HIV infection, they report June 23 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Antiretroviral therapy has proved to be a life-saving treatment for those infected with HIV. Yet even after treatment, most patients still harbor latent HIV in...
Common childhood vaccine might prevent severe complications of COVID-19
New Orleans, LA – A paper published by Paul Fidel, Jr., PhD, Professor and Director of the Center of Excellence in Oral and Craniofacial Biology and Associate Dean for Research at LSU Health New Orleans School of Dentistry, and Mairi Noverr, PhD, Professor of Microbiology & Immunology at Tulane University School of Medicine in New...
What are Furin Proteases?
By Benedette Cuffari, M.Sc. Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc. In order to develop appropriate treatments and vaccines to combat the novel coronavirus, otherwise known as SARS-CoV-2 or COVID-19, researchers around the world have carefully examined every microscopic component of this potent virus. What is protease? The term protease is used to describe a large group...
Extracts of the plant A. annua are active against SARS-CoV-2
by Freie Universitaet Berlin Chemists at the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces (Potsdam, Germany) in close collaboration with virologists at Freie Universität Berlin have shown in laboratory studies that aqueous and ethanolic extracts of specially bred sweet wormwood plants (A. annua) are active against the new coronavirus that has caused the COIVID-19 pandemic....
Transgenic rice containing anti-hypertensive peptides lowers blood pressure in hypertensive rats
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc. In the future, taking your blood pressure medication could be as simple as eating a spoonful of rice. This “treatment” could also have fewer side effects than current blood pressure medicines. As a first step, researchers reporting in ACS’ Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistryhave made transgenic rice that contains...