immunity News and Research

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Technique to reduce the toxicity of vaccines demonstrated

Researchers have demonstrated a technique that has the potential to reduce the toxicity of vaccines and to make smaller doses more effective, according to a study published in PLoS Pathogens.

30 Dec 2005

World's deadliest malaria parasite cloaking gene revealed

The world's deadliest malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum, sneaks past the human immune system with the help of a wardrobe of invisibility cloaks. If a person's immune cells learn to recognize one of the parasite's many camouflage proteins, the surviving invaders can swap disguises and slip away again to cause more damage. Malaria kills an estimated 2.7 million people annually worldwide, 75 percent of them children in Africa.

29 Dec 2005

New anthrax antibody

A new anthrax antibody engineered by scientists at The University of Texas at Austin protects and defends against inhalation anthrax without the use of antibiotics and other more expensive antibodies.

2 Dec 2005

Risk of severe asthma episodes predicted from fluctuation analysis of airway function

A startling new study published in the science journal Nature this week (Nature Vol 438, issue 7068, pp 667-670) reveals that inhalers used by asthmatics for symptomatic relief of their condition might actually increase the likelihood of an acute attack.

30 Nov 2005

Drug partners in fight against AIDS say measles shot could be the answer!

Major drug company GlaxoSmithKline is hoping to develop an experimental AIDS vaccine by "piggy-backing" on a shot against measles.

29 Nov 2005

Romania culls thousands of fowl to stop the spread of bird flu

A remote village outside the Danube delta has been quarantined after the discovery of an avian flu virus in a turkey.

28 Nov 2005

Enhancement of vaccine-mediated antitumor immunity in cancer patients after depletion of regulatory T cells

Duke University researchers have now shown that selectively killing the population of regulatory T cells in cancer patients - cells that normally function to restrain the activity of the immune response - improves the ability of a cancer vaccine to stimulate tumor-specific T cells.

28 Nov 2005

Promising functional readouts of immunity in a blood-stage malaria vaccine trial

A malaria vaccine remains the most desired tool to combat the worsening malaria epidemic in many developing countries. Pierre Druilhe and colleagues (from the Institut Pasteur in Paris) have completed the first human trial of a vaccine based on MSP3, a protein present on the surface of the malaria parasite, with very encouraging results.

13 Nov 2005

Bird flu in two Kuwait birds a far weaker strain

According to health officials in Kuwait two birds infected with avian flu have been destroyed, but it seems the strain of the virus present in the birds is weaker than the one which has killed more than 60 people in Asia.

13 Nov 2005

Tryptophan metabolites play an important role in the immune system

Tryptophan is the source of Thanksgiving legend and grist for a "Seinfeld" episode, but it's not the chemical that you'd expect to find in Lawrence Steinman's lab.

7 Nov 2005

Dendritic cells tricked into action against cancer

A new type of immunotherapy in which dendritic cells are tricked into action against cancer when they are exposed to harmless pieces of viruses and bacteria is described in the November issue of Cancer Research.

1 Nov 2005

Canada wild ducks unlikely to have H5N1 virus

Canadian health officials say they have found a strain of avian flu in 33 wild migratory ducks, but it is unlikely to be the killer H5N1 strain which has spread from Southeast Asia to Europe.

31 Oct 2005

Vaccination against measles could prevent many more cases of SSPE, than previously thought

A new study has found wild-type measles virus in tissues from patients who died of a fatal brain infection, providing evidence against the notion that the strain of virus in the measles vaccine caused the infection.

30 Oct 2005

HDLs provide human immunity to certain parasites

For years biomedical researchers have known that high density lipoproteins, commonly called HDLs or "good cholesterol," are responsible for protecting humans from certain parasites, but couldn't explain how.

30 Oct 2005

Morphine withdrawal enhances hepatitis C virus (HCV) replicon expression

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have demonstrated that morphine withdrawal complicates hepatitis C by suppressing IFN-alpha-mediated immunity and enhancing virus replication.

30 Oct 2005

Possible toxic damage from inhaled nanoparticles

A physicist and a medical researcher at the University of Leicester have received a grant of £100,000 from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to look at possible toxic damage from inhaled nanoparticles used for a range of everyday purposes.

27 Oct 2005

New treatments suggest that cancer is on the run!

People suffering from cancer will be encouraged by a cluster of recent reports on successful new treatments for several different forms of cancer.

24 Oct 2005

Researchers learn to rapidly rebuild immunity in immune-suppressed cancer patients

Patients with multiple myeloma suffer from a malignant proliferation of plasma cells in their bone marrow. The standard treatment for this form of cancer is high-dose chemotherapy and transplantation of one's own blood-producing adult stem cells; however, this aggressive treatment wipes out the mature immune-system cells of patients – leaving them vulnerable to infection.

20 Oct 2005

Avian flu and planning for pandemic

Influenza season is almost upon us. While it is impossible to tell whether we are going to experience a usual flu season -- with one in every five people falling ill -- or whether we are facing a more serious problem such as a dangerous new strain capable of causing a global pandemic, information is important.

20 Oct 2005

Evidence is mounting to link toxoplasmosis with schizophrenia

Keep pet cats inside, stop feeding strays, cook meat sufficiently and reconsider the way the veterinary profession and public health agencies think - and teach - about the zoonotic pathogen Toxoplasma gondii.

18 Oct 2005