Category: Science and Tech
Viruses May Be “Watching” You – Lying in Wait Before Multiplying and Killing
SciTechDaily – Viruses may be ‘watching’ you – some microbes lie in wait until their hosts unintentionally give them the signal to start multiplying and kill them. Especially after more than two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, many people picture a virus as a nasty spiked ball – essentially a mindless killer that gets into a cell […]
Sep 26, 2022
How COVID-19 stole our sense of smell
Chemical Engineering News – SARS-CoV-2 has left thousands with a distorted or lost sense of smell. This population is helping researchers identify what happens when smell goes wrong and what might help. Researchers are getting a clearer idea of how. This understanding and a growing awareness of olfactory disorders could help others facing smell loss […]
Sep 26, 2022
New COVID variants may evade current treatments—or render them entirely ineffective, experts say
Fortune – Future COVID variants are expected to be more transmissible and perhaps better at evading the immune system. And they might even render treatments for patients like monoclonal antibodies “less effective,” the World Health Organization’s pandemic lead said Thursday. Van Kerkhove said that the WHO is keeping an eye on Omicron variants BA.5—currently dominant […]
Sep 23, 2022
An ACE2-dependent Sarbecovirus in Russian bats is resistant to SARS-CoV-2 vaccines
PLoS Pathogens – Spillover of sarbecoviruses from animals to humans has resulted in outbreaks of severe acute respiratory syndrome SARS-CoVs and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Efforts to identify the origins of SARS-CoV-1 and -2 has resulted in the discovery of numerous animal sarbecoviruses–the majority of which are only distantly related to known human pathogens and […]
Sep 23, 2022
Forbes – Many viruses rely on proteases to process polypeptides into smaller proteins required for replication and virus production. SARS-CoV-2 is no exception. It contains two proteases in the long open reading frame of ORF1A1B that encode for 15 proteins which need proteolytic processing. Main protease, or Mpro, is the cysteine protease responsible for most […]
Sep 23, 2022
18 U.S. Labs Join Forces To Battle Infectious Diseases
Texas A&M – Leading experts from research universities and federal agencies gathered at Texas A&M to discuss how to better protect the nation from high-consequence pathogens that harm livestock and wildlife.
Sep 22, 2022
New Tool Guides Clinicians to Identify and Treat Patients at Risk for Monkeypox Virus
Mass General – In the setting of the current global monkeypox outbreak, clinicians are on now alert to identify, isolate, and treat individuals infected with the virus that causes it. Investigators recently developed a clinical decision support system to help with this effort, and they tested its initial performance in a large integrated healthcare system.
Sep 22, 2022
Why are so many viruses popping up again?
Washington Post – Several factors help explain why we’re hearing so much about viral outbreaks. Shifts in migration and travel patterns, global eating habits and the effects of climate change have created new opportunities for microbes to spread. Better testing and monitoring methods also mean we’re detecting these outbreaks sooner than in the past.
Sep 22, 2022