Coronavirus Disease COVID 19 News and Research

Latest Coronavirus Disease COVID 19 News and Research

Study finds SARS-CoV-2 infection of endothelial cells unlikely

Researchers from the University of Queensland have investigated whether infection of endothelial cells with SARS-CoV-2 is possible.

8 Nov 2021

Conspiracists during the COVID-19 pandemic

A researcher from the University of Pennsylvania has commented on how conspiracy theories misrepresent scientific data and advice.

8 Nov 2021

Identification of a candidate effector gene at COVID-19 risk locus

A new study focuses on developing a comprehensive platform to decode the effects of sequence variation identified by GWAS.

8 Nov 2021

COVID-19 vaccination and deaths amongst US veterans

A new study studies the vaccine effectiveness and death in the Veterans Health Administration.

8 Nov 2021

A review of antigen-detecting rapid diagnostic tests for COVID-19

Scientists conducted a systematic review of the use cases and performance of Ag-RDTs for detecting SARS-CoV-2.

8 Nov 2021

Reproduction number of COVID-19 in Africa

Scientists used a SEIR model and a Bayesian inference framework to estimate the basic reproduction number of COVID-19 across Africa.

8 Nov 2021

As constituents clamor for ivermectin, Republican politicians embrace the cause

When state senators in South Carolina held two hearings in September about covid-19 treatments, they got an earful on the benefits of ivermectin — which many of the lawmakers echoed, sharing experiences of their own loved ones.

8 Nov 2021

Study looks at how lupus genetics intersects with COVID-19

The study “Interferon pathway lupus risk alleles modulate risk of death from acute COVID-19” was recently published on the preprint medRxiv* server.

8 Nov 2021

Georgia study finds increase in pediatric COVID-19 cases

Led by Sarita Shah of Emory University, a new study shows low COVID-19 testing in children, suggesting the results are an underestimation of the true burden of disease.

8 Nov 2021

Researchers explain why decaying SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in blood are not a problem after vaccination

A new study published in the preprint bioRxiv* server suggests vaccination helps to inflate the number of somatic hypermutations acquired by B cells. The increase in somatic hypermutations allows for an accumulation of highly matured bone marrow plasma cells.

8 Nov 2021

Pacific oyster shows antiviral activity against human coronavirus HCoV-229E

Not only are Pacific oysters (Crassostrea gigas) a seafood delicacy, but they may also be key for helping scientists figure out how to stop the spread of coronaviruses.

7 Nov 2021

Rapid antibody response induced by mRNA COVID vaccines in mice

A new study posted in the bioRxiv* preprint server used mouse models to investigate how mRNA vaccines elicit a rapid antibody response. Their findings show two different mRNA vaccines successfully boost antibody levels — IL-5, IL-6, and MCP-1 —5 days after administration.

7 Nov 2021

Highly-sensitive PCR-based method to detect SARS-CoV-2 variants

A team of UK-based scientists has recently developed an allele-specific probe polymerase chain reaction method that can accurately detect different variants/lineages of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in respiratory samples. Furthermore, the method can detect viral variants even in samples with low viral RNA or degraded viral RNA. The study is currently available on the medRxiv* preprint server.

7 Nov 2021

Pacific oyster as a weapon against SARS-CoV-2

According to an article published in the journal Reviews in Medical Virology, the effectiveness of mollusc-derived antiviral agents has been proven in many different laboratory and animal studies, while its efficacy against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has also been proposed by recent in silico studies.

7 Nov 2021