Virology News and Research

Latest Virology News and Research

Study examines community-based HIV testing programs in Africa, Southeast Asia

If you want to improve HIV testing rates in remote rural areas, get the community involved, says UCLA's Thomas Coates, who has directed a new study examining HIV testing programs in communities in Africa and Southeast Asia.

6 May 2011

Researchers solve mysteries of chikungunya's emergence in Asia

What causes a virus to suddenly begin infecting large numbers of people? Scientists have long known that the process they call "viral emergence" involves a wide variety of factors. Some are changes in the environment, either generated by natural causes or human activity. Others are internal, arising from accidental changes - mutations -in the virus' genetic code.

6 May 2011

Quest Diagnostics' Simplexa C. difficile test is now available in Europe

Quest Diagnostics Incorporated, the world's leading provider of diagnostic testing, information and services, today announced the availability in Europe of the Simplexa C. difficile Universal Direct test on the 3M Integrated Cycler.

From Quest Diagnostics 6 May 2011

Hendra virus alert among horse owners

Hendra virus is a bat-borne virus that has killed four of the seven humans who have been infected and caused the deaths more than 40 horses since it was discovered in 1994. Humans contract the disease from horses but there has been neither human-to-human transmission of the disease nor direct transmission from bats to humans report experts. The majority of outbreaks have occurred during June and October, however last year a horse in Tewantin contracted the virus in May.

5 May 2011

EraGen workshop to address two topics on real-time PCR-based viral monitoring tests

EraGen Biosciences Inc. today announced that it will host a corporate workshop at the upcoming Clinical Virology Symposium, which is being held May 8-11 in Daytona Beach, Fla. The workshop will take place at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, May 10, at the Ocean Center in Daytona Beach.

5 May 2011

Study: XMRV retrovirus is not present in chronic fatigue syndrome patients

New findings from University of Utah School of Medicine researchers show that the retrovirus called XMRV is not present in the blood of patients who have chronic fatigue syndrome.

5 May 2011

Breakthrough research offers hope for new obesity treatment

By knocking down the expression of a protein in rat brains known to stimulate eating, Johns Hopkins researchers say they not only reduced the animals' calorie intake and weight, but also transformed their fat into a type that burns off more energy. The finding could lead to better obesity treatments for humans, the scientists report.

4 May 2011

New nano-vault delivery system can fight cancer

UCLA scientists have discovered a way to wake up the immune system to fight cancer by delivering an immune system-stimulating protein in a nanoscale container called a vault directly into lung cancer tumors, harnessing the body's natural defenses to fight disease growth.

4 May 2011

AHF cautions against fast track FDA-approval for expanded use of Gilead’s Truvada

During its quarterly meeting over the weekend, The Board of Directors of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) adopted a resolution cautioning Gilead Sciences against seeking fast track FDA-approval for the expanded use of its best selling AIDS treatment, Truvada, as a possible form of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to prevent the transmission of HIV.

4 May 2011

NanoViricides' FluCide drug candidate greatly reduces lung viral load in animals

NanoViricides, Inc. reports that post-infection treatment with its optimized FluCide drug candidates achieved 1,000-fold reduction in the levels of infectious virus in the lungs of animals with a lethal level of influenza virus infection.

3 May 2011

Lopinavir can combat HPV-related cervical cancer

A widely used HIV drug could be used to prevent cervical cancer caused by infection with the human papilloma virus, say scientists.

3 May 2011

Astex earns GBP5.9 M milestone payment from GSK for fragment-based screening platform

Astex Therapeutics, the UK-based biotechnology company developing targeted therapies for oncology and virology, announced that it has achieved multiple early milestones in its fragment-based drug discovery collaboration with GlaxoSmithKline which commenced in November 2009.

3 May 2011

More HIV infections linked to injection drug use in East Africa, report finds

FDA clears ITI's FilmArray RP assay for respiratory virus detection

Idaho Technology, Inc. announced today that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has issued a 510(k) clearance for the FilmArray instrument and the FilmArray Respiratory Panel.

3 May 2011

Viewpoints: Ryan plan politics; senior care; health care consumerism

Democrats spent the last week of Easter recess bashing the GOP on the Medicare reforms in the Paul Ryan budget, and Republicans tell me they are feeling the heat back home.

3 May 2011

Pregnant women with H1N1 more likely to have low birth weight baby

In 2009, the United States was gripped by concern for a new winter threat: the H1N1 strain of influenza. According to research conducted through that winter, pregnant women were right to be concerned.

3 May 2011

New method helps scientists to determine specific protein molecular structure

The structures of many protein molecules remain unsolved even after experts apply an extensive array of approaches. An international collaboration has led to a new, high-performance method that rapidly determined the structure of protein molecules in several cases where previous methods had failed.

2 May 2011

MedImmune abstracts on influenza and RSV to be presented at PAS meeting

MedImmune announced today it will present 11 abstracts at the Pediatric Academic Societies Meeting at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver, CO, April 30 - May 3, 2011.

2 May 2011

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announces 88 new winners under Grand Challenges Exploration program

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation today announced 88 new winners of US$100,000 each to support innovative research that has the potential to dramatically improve lives in some of the world's poorest countries. The funding, made possible through the Grand Challenges Exploration (GCE) program, will enable researchers worldwide to test unorthodox ideas that address persistent health and development challenges.

30 Apr 2011

HIV/AIDS research in Africa

Nowhere in the world has the AIDS/HIV pandemic cut a greater swath of devastation than in sub-Saharan Africa, where two-thirds of all people infected with the virus reside. As Barbara Smith, PhD, RN, FAAN, discovered firsthand, no segment of society there has been left unscathed.

30 Apr 2011