Next generation vaccines for COVID-19 should aim to induce an immune response against 'replication proteins', essential for the very earliest stages of the viral cycle, researchers say.
Scientists have found how the immune system triggers an 'emergency' dendritic cell response during infection, with dendritic cells at the site of infection being reinforced by new cells which travel from the bone marrow.
Viral infections peak in January and bottom out in June, with worse seasons every second year -- an ebb and flow that could help the health-care system plan ahead.
Scientists have shown that coronavirus vaccines and prior coronavirus infections can provide broad immunity against other, similar coronaviruses. The findings build a rationale for universal coronavirus vaccines that could prove useful in the face of future epidemics.
Patients who have cardiovascular disease are at increased risk of serious complications from the flu, according to a new study. The study found that not only are traditional flu-related outcomes worse among some patients with CVD, but infection in those patients also is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events. Getting the influenza vaccine, however, substantially reduces cardiovascular risks.
By creating the Universal Influenza-like Transmission (UnIT) score, which leverages data about past flu seasons, researchers have produced a new model of COVID-19 incidence that outperforms all other prediction models on average over the pandemic timeline so far.
Testing pooled saliva samples twice weekly for SARS-CoV-2 on a residential college campus yielded a greater than 95 percent agreement with the gold standard for accuracy -- nasopharyngeal diagnostic samples tested singly.
Poor timing of influenza vaccination campaigns in the semi-arid region of Brazil led to an increase in premature births, lower birth-weight babies and the need to deliver more babies by cesarean section.
To prevent the spread of COVID-19 indoors, the two meters physical distancing guideline is not enough without masks, according to researchers. However, wearing a mask indoors can reduce the contamination range of airborne particles by about 67 percent.
A new study on foot-and-mouth disease among buffalo in South Africa could help explain how certain extremely contagious pathogens are able to persist and reach endemic stage in a population, long after they've burned through their initial pool of susceptible hosts.
Scientists describe the structure of a key protein on the surface of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) and how it interacts with its receptor found on some human cells. The findings provide new leads for developing an HCV vaccine.
CD8+ T cells -- known as "killer" T cells -- are the assassins of the immune system. Once they are primed, they seek out and destroy other cells that are infected with virus or cells that are cancerous. Priming involves dendritic cells -- sentinels of the immune system. In an influenza infection in the lungs, for example, lung-migratory dendritic cells capture a piece of the viral antigen, and then migrate out of the lung to the place where naïve T cells reside, to present that antigen to the CD8+ T cells. This primes the T cells to know which cells to attack. The place for the priming in influenza had long been thought to be restricted to a single anatomical site -- the lung-draining, mediastinal lymph nodes that lie between the lungs and the spine. This lymph node-centric paradigm now has been challenged.
A buildup of coronavirus in the lungs is likely behind the steep mortality rates seen in the pandemic, a new study finds. The results contrast with previous suspicions that simultaneous infections, such as bacterial pneumonia or overreaction of the body's immune defense system, played major roles in heightened risk of death, the investigators say.
A laboratory study finds that blood serum drawn from people previously vaccinated or naturally infected show 'significantly reduced' defense against two variants of the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Researchers said that their findings emphasize the importance of vaccinations combined with maintaining public health measures to cut off the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
The breast milk of lactating mothers vaccinated against COVID-19 contains a significant supply of antibodies that may help protect nursing infants from the illness, according to new research.
The COVID-19 pandemic may be the deadliest viral outbreak the world has seen in more than a century. But statistically, such extreme events aren't as rare as we may think, asserts a new analysis of novel disease outbreaks over the past 400 years. A newly assembled record of past outbreaks was used to estimate the probability of a pandemic with similar impact to COVID-19 is about 2 percent in any year. And that probability is growing.
While gut microbiota play a critical role in the induction of adaptive immune responses to influenza virus infection, the role of nasal bacteria in the induction of virus-specific adaptive immunity is less clear. New research explores the role of nasal bacteria and provides clues to developing better intranasal vaccines for flu and COVID-19.