Immunology

A study led by researchers from the Madrid Carlos III Institute of Health associates the increase of cholera cases in Zambia with climate factors.  They say their results confirm that the increase in environmental temperature six weeks before the rain season increases the number of people affected by this sickness by 4.9%. "This is the first time that it has become evident in the sub-Saharan region that the increase in environmental temperature is related to the increase in cholera cases,¨ explained Miguel Ángel Luque, one of the study's authors and researcher from the Madrid Carlos III…

Parasite infestations might have a good side. Wild mice from a Nottinghamshire forest have given experts at The University of Nottingham clues as to the importance of some parasites, such as lice, for the conditioning of a "natural" immune system. Jan Bradley, Professor of Parasitology, said: "Our understanding of mammalian immunology is largely based on rodents reared under highly unnatural pathogen and stress-free conditions. Analysing the immune response in wild populations can give crucial insights into how the immune system functions in its natural context." Many health problems in…

Science is great at finding new rules for expectant mothers.  They already can’t have alcohol, caffeine, or cigarettes. They also need to stay away from their cat’s litterbox, stay off of planes and rollercoasters, stay off of antidepressants, drop their acne medication, and forgo even a well-considered vegan diet. Now they have to avoid the Hong Kong flu, too.  The Annals of Neurobiology recently published a study that suggested that exposure to the Hong Kong virus during the first trimester of pregnancy may contribute to decreased adult intelligence.   The Hong Kong flu is…

Australian scientists say they have made a discovery that may one day remove the need for a lifetime of toxic immunosuppressive drugs after organ transplants. Professor Jonathan Sprent and Dr Kylie Webster from Sydney's Garvan Institute of Medical Research, in collaboration with colleagues, Dr Shane Grey and Stacey Walters, have successfully tested a method, in experimental mice, of adjusting the immune system for just long enough to receive a tissue transplant and accept it as 'self'. At no stage, during or after the procedure, is there any need for immunosuppressive drugs.  Sprent…

Re-engineering a protein that helps prevent tumours spreading and growing has created a potentially powerful therapy for people with many different types of cancer. In a study published in the first issue of EMBO Molecular Medicine, Canadian researchers modified the tumour inhibiting protein, von Hippel-Lindau (VHL), and demonstrated that it could suppress tumour growth in mice. When solid tumours grow they often have relatively poor and disorganised blood supplies. As a result, various regions including the centre of the tumour have low levels of oxygen and are said to be hypoxic. Cells in…

One of the largest health threats facing our society today is not some super-virus spread from birds, or a tropical parasite spread by mosquito. Instead, it is the increasing resistance of common bacteria to antibiotics and even severe antibacterial treatment. Antibiotics have allowed us some amount of freedom from harmful bacterial infections, diseases and death, but as our antibiotics become overused, and ineffective against infection, our freedom from disease is significantly limited. In response to the growing problem of bacterial resistance, researchers have launched efforts to find new…

The bacterium Escherichia coli is part of the healthy human intestinal flora. However, E. coli also has pathogenic relatives that trigger diarrhea illnesses: enterohemorrhagic E.coli bacteria. During the course of an infection they infest the intestinal mucosa, causing injury in the process, in contrast to benign bacteria.  The EHECs adhere to the surface of the mucosal cells and alter them internally: a part of the cellular supportive skeleton - the actin skeleton - is rearranged in such a manner that the cell surface beneath the bacteria forms plinth-like growths, so-called pedestals.…

A new computerized method of testing could help world health officials better identify flu vaccines that are effective against multiple strains of the disease. Rice University scientists who created the method say tests of data from bird flu and seasonal flu outbreaks suggest their method can better gauge the efficacy of proposed vaccines than can tests used today. Influenza viruses are like chameleons. They constantly change the patterns on their outer surface to avoid being targeted by antibodies. This rapid mutation rate is the reason seasonal flu vaccines must be changed annually. However…

Rutgers AIDS researchers Gail Ferstandig Arnold and Eddy Arnold and colleagues say they may have turned a corner in their search for a HIV vaccine. The researchers say they have been able to take a piece of HIV that is involved with helping the virus enter cells, put it on the surface of a common cold virus, and then immunize animals with it. They found that the animals made antibodies that can stop an unusually diverse set of HIV isolates or varieties.  Some researchers have previously been able to elicit effective antibodies, but usually only against a very limited number of HIV types…

The immune response can protect us from basically any invader but it can also create disease - like it happens in autoimmunity where it attacks the own body - so to understand its regulation is an important tool to assure its proper functioning. In a Nature Immunology article, scientists in Portugal study one of the least understood white blood cells subsets – the gamma delta T cells – and reveal that it is composed by two distinct functional groups that can be identified according to the expression of a molecule called CD27, which is also determinant deciding which subset dominates the…