Science and Health News

A component of the skin mucus secreted by South Indian frogs can kill the H1 variety of influenza viruses, researchers from Emory Vaccine Center and the Rajiv Gandhi Center for Biotechnology in India have discovered.

Scientists have uncovered how our ancestors may have wiped out an ancient retrovirus around 11 million years ago.

Giant viruses appear to have evolved from smaller viruses (not from cells) based on presence of nearly complete set of translation-related genes.

Malaria mosquitoes prefer to feed – and feed more – on blood from people infected with malaria. Researchers from Stockholm University, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and KTH Royal Institute of Technology have discovered why. The findings can lead to new ways to fight malaria without using poisonous chemicals. The results will be published in the next issue of the journal Science.

A study led by Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) finds that vitamin D supplements protect against acute respiratory infections including colds and flu.

Researchers of the University of Tübingen and DZIF in collaboration with the biotech company Sanaria Inc. have demonstrated in a clinical trial that a new vaccine for malaria called Sanaria® PfSPZ-CVac has been up to 100 percent effective when assessed at 10 weeks after last dose of vaccine. For the trial, Professor Peter Kremsner and Dr. Benjamin Mordmüller of the Institute of Tropical Medicine and the German Center for Infection Research used malaria parasites provided by Sanaria. The vaccine incorporated fully viable – not weakened or otherwise inactivated – malaria pathogens together with the medication to combat them.

Perena Gouma, a professor in the Materials Science and Engineering Department at The University of Texas at Arlington, has published an article in the journal Sensors that describes her invention of a hand-held breath monitor that can detect the flu virus.

CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology has been used for the first time to successfully produce live cows with increased resistance to bovine tuberculosis, reports new research published in the open access journal Genome Biology.