Science Study of blood from severely ill patients implicates a gene involved in the production of fatty acids After a 2013 outbreak of avian influenza in China killed about 35% of the people it infected, immunologist Katherine Kedzierska of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity set out to answer a baffling question: Why did some patients die while others survived?
This week in Cell, Kedzierska and colleagues at 16 other institutes around the world provide a possible answer. The sickest people, it turns out, produced significantly higher levels of an enzyme called oleoyl-acyl-carrier-protein hydrolase (OLAH), which is involved in the production of oleic acid, a fatty substance critical to human health that is found in our cell membranes. Before this study, “nothing was known that linked it to infectious diseases,” Kedzierska says.
OLAH appears to determine the odds of succumbing to several other viral respiratory diseases as well, including COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). The researchers hope the finding can help identify patients at high risk of severe complications early in the disease course, and they are hunting for treatments that can bring down OLAH levels.