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Most people living with HIV control the virus thanks to antiretroviral therapy (ART). Although this medication is highly effective, the presence of latent viral reservoirs in their bodies means they require lifelong therapy. Studies have demonstrated that immunotherapy combining two anti-HIV antibodies can also suppress HIV, similar to ART. Now an international team of researchers […]
Scientists from Trinity have discovered both how TB puts the brakes on our immune engines and how we can kick-start those engines back into gear—providing hope that improved treatment options could soon be on the horizon. Although ancient, TB is still the world’s deadliest infectious disease. While it is rampant in Africa, the growing problem […]
Most bacterial species prefer to live in biofilms, where they are protected from antibiotic treatments and can lead to chronic and recurrent diseases in humans. To address this problem, researchers at Nationwide Children’s Hospital have developed a novel synthetic peptide that mimics an essential component of bacterial biofilms. When used as a vaccine, it redirects […]
The immune system must learn from early in life to tolerate bacteria that normally populate healthy skin, while still defending against more dangerous “bugs,” but how immune cells make this distinction has long been a mystery. In a study of young mice, UC San Francisco scientists found that an early-life window of immune tolerance available […]
Close to 1.8 billion people worldwide are infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the common and occasionally deadly bacterium that causes millions of cases of tuberculosis each year. The bacteria, having coevolved with humans over millennia, have devised ways of hijacking nutrients from its human host for its own benefit. Humans have equally complex ways of […]
Scientists have shown how measles causes long-term damage to the immune system, leaving people vulnerable to other infections. Researchers from the Wellcome Sanger Institute, University of Amsterdam and their collaborators revealed that the measles virus deletes part of the immune system’s memory, removing previously existing immunity to other infections, in both humans and ferrets. Importantly, […]
Messy tangles of a protein called tau can be found in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease and some other neurodegenerative diseases. In Alzheimer’s, the tangles coalesce just before tissue damage becomes visible in brain scans and people start to become forgetful and confused. Now, a new study has found that brain immune cells […]
A new liquid biopsy test could detect microsatellite instability (MSI) and tumor mutational burden (TMB), indicating that it could help determine which patients are likely to respond to immune checkpoint inhibitors, according to results published in Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. In May 2017, the U.S. Food and […]
Five scientists have won prestigious medical awards for creating an innovative breast cancer treatment and discovering key players of the disease-fighting immune system. They will share two $250,000 awards from the Lasker Foundation, to be presented later this month in New York, the foundation announced Tuesday. One prize honors the invention of Herceptin, a breast […]
Females are less susceptible to infection but are 10 times more likely than males to develop an autoimmune disorder, such as hypothyroidism or rheumatoid arthritis. The female immune system is “a double-edged sword” in that way, said Jennifer Franko, a teaching assistant professor in the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cell Biology at the West […]