Microbiology News and Research

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Researchers identify how Toxoplasma parasite crosses blood-brain barrier

An estimated 30 percent of the world's population is chronically infected with the parasite Toxoplasma gondii. Most people live with the infection without noticeable effect, but it can be life-threatening for people with suppressed immune systems, such as people on cancer therapies or who have HIV/AIDS.

16 Feb 2016

TUM researchers make progress in bringing immunotherapy to fight against cancer, infectious diseases

The quest to bring immunotherapy into widespread clinical use against cancer and infectious diseases has made great strides in recent years.

15 Feb 2016

Nine researchers win EPSRC Healthcare Technologies Challenge Awards

Nine researchers, working on innovative projects that promise to improve healthcare diagnosis and treatment, across a wide spread of issues, were today announced as the first recipients of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council's (EPSRC) Healthcare Technologies Challenge Awards.

15 Feb 2016

New approach could be used to treat Duchenne muscular dystrophy

Scientists at the UCLA Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research and Center for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy at UCLA have developed a new approach that could eventually be used to treat Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

14 Feb 2016

Nutrients in food may influence our genes

Almost all of our genes may be influenced by the food we eat, suggests new research published today in the journal Nature Microbiology. The study, carried out in yeast - which can be used to model some of the body's fundamental processes - shows that while the activity of our genes influences our metabolism, the opposite is also true and the nutrients available to cells influence our genes.

12 Feb 2016

Transition to family foods drives development of infant gut microbiota

After the age of nine months, the development of the infant gut microbiota is driven by the transition to family foods, not maternal obesity, according to results from a new study. The study was published online this week in mSphere, an open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.

11 Feb 2016

ESCMID gathers more solid data to better assess Zika virus risks, prepares for possible outbreak in Africa, Europe

Experts at the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases – an organization promoting research, risk assessment, knowledge sharing and best practices in the fight against infectious diseases – are developing tools to monitor the spread of the Zika virus and are conducting research to gather more solid data to better assess the risks associated with the infection.

10 Feb 2016

Oral therapeutic drug shows promise against recurrent C. difficile infection

Results from a Phase 1b/2 trial suggest that an investigational microbiome-based, oral therapeutic drug is effective for the treatment of recurrent C. difficile infection. In a paper published online in the Journal of Infectious Diseases, a multi-institutional research team reports that treatment with the preparation, containing the spores of approximately 50 species of beneficial bacteria, successfully prevented recurrence of C. difficile infection (CDI) in patients with a history of multiple recurrent disease.

10 Feb 2016

UM SOM researchers reveal genetic makeup of various strains of E. coli

A multi-disciplinary group of researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine have for the first time determined the genetic makeup of various strains of E. coli, which every year kills hundreds of thousands of people around the world.

9 Feb 2016

Gut microbes influence severity of malaria

Microorganisms in the gut could play a role in reducing the severity of malaria, according to a new study co-authored by researchers at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and the University of Louisville.

9 Feb 2016

UIC researchers discover molecular switch that allows salmonella bacteria to fight immune system

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago have discovered a molecular regulator that allows salmonella bacteria to switch from actively causing disease to lurking in a chronic but asymptomatic state called a biofilm.

7 Feb 2016

Early use of influenza drug in pregnant women with flu may reduce length of stay in hospital

Pregnant women are at higher risk for serious illness and complications, including death, from influenza. For expectant mothers hospitalized with flu, early treatment with the influenza antiviral drug oseltamivir may shorten their time in the hospital, especially in severe cases, suggests a new study published in The Journal of Infectious Diseases and available online.

5 Feb 2016

Duke researchers identify promising target for renal cell carcinomas

All cells need nutrients, but cancer cells are notoriously power hungry. As a result, cancer cells must alter their metabolism to provide the additional fuel needed for them to survive, grow and spread.

4 Feb 2016

Innate lymphoid cells get destroyed in patients infected with HIV

A research project headed by Henrik Kloeverpris, a postdoc at the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at the University of Copenhagen, shows that the so-called ILCs (innate lymphoid cells) - a component of the immune system crucial to maintaining immune system balance - are destroyed in patients infected with HIV.

4 Feb 2016

Researchers show how bacterial colony protects itself against toxic substances

Bacterial populations move over surfaces in coordinated way known as swarming, which allows them to spread further over organs and tissues and increases the virulence of the infection. This movement is driven by the action of the flagella and the chemoreceptors, the systems responsible for identifying chemical compounds in the environment and which are anchored at the poles of their cells, forming highly organised structures, of which the protein CheW forms part.

1 Feb 2016

Remicade co-developer funds new microscopy facility on Scripps Florida campus

The co-developer of Remicade, one of the three top-selling drugs in the world, has donated more than $500,000 to fund what will be known as the Iris and Junming Le Foundation Super-Resolution Microscopy Facility on the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute.

30 Jan 2016

Sphingosine kinase inhibitor slows castration-resistant prostate cancer cell growth

A first-in-class sphingosine kinase 2 inhibitor slowed the growth of castration-resistant prostate cancer cells, in part by inhibiting the enzyme dihydroceramide desaturase (DEGS), but did not kill them, according to the results of preclinical in vitro and in vivo studies published in the December 2015 issue of Molecular Cancer Therapeutics by researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina and others.

30 Jan 2016