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Certain white blood cells play an important role in bringing a harmful virus under control after kidney transplantations. The results of a research group at the Department of Biomedicine at the University of Basel and University Hospital Basel could contribute to improving control of immunosuppression, avoiding transplant rejection and developing relevant vaccines.

Suffering through a cold is annoying enough, but if you're lonely, you're likely to feel even worse, according to Rice University researchers. A study led by Rice psychologist Chris Fagundes and graduate student Angie LeRoy indicated people who feel lonely are more prone to report that their cold symptoms are more severe than those who have stronger social networks.

Effective care and prevention strategies have managed to reduce the spread of HIV in the U.S. and other resource-rich countries. But in sub-Saharan Africa, where more than 25 million are infected, the epidemic rages - as does the debate over how to stop it. The World Health Organization and UNAIDS have proposed using “treatment as prevention” to eliminate HIV in sub-Saharan Africa. The strategy would treat people infected with HIV to reduce their ability to infect others as a way to prevent them from transmitting the infection. UNAIDS has set goals to diagnose 90 percent of HIV-infected people and to treat 90 percent of those diagnosed individuals by 2020. But a new study by UCLA researchers concludes that although the plan sounds laudable, implementing it might not be feasible.

In response to the yellow fever outbreak currently on-going in Brazil some 3.5 million doses of vaccine from the emergency stockpile were deployed to the country through the International Coordinating Group (ICG) on Vaccine Provision for yellow fever. The ICG oversees a continuously replenished emergency stockpile of 6 million doses of yellow fever vaccine. The ICG includes four agencies: the World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF,) the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), and Médicines Sans Frontières (MSF). The Government of Brazil will reimburse the cost of the 3.5 million doses sent through the yellow fever emergency stockpile financed by Gavi Alliance.

About half of all women will experience urinary tract infections in their lifetimes, and despite treatment, about a quarter will develop recurrent infections within six months of initial infection. A new study at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has uncovered a trigger of recurrent UTI infections: a type of vaginal bacteria that moves into the urinary tract. The research, in mice, was published March 30 in PLOS Pathogens.

A Purdue University study shows that the bacteria Listeria monocytogenes can live inside the tissue of romaine lettuce, suggesting that conventional post-harvest sanitization practices might not be sufficient to kill the potentially lethal pathogen.

Researchers have found that a hormone responsible for controlling iron metabolism helps fight off a severe form of bacterial pneumonia, and that discovery may offer a simple way to help vulnerable patients. The researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have identified a key hormone critical for preventing pneumonia bacteria from spreading throughout the body. The hormone, hepcidin, is produced in the liver and limits the spread of the bacteria by hiding the iron in the blood that the bacteria need to survive and grow.

By engineering an on/off switch into a weakened form of HIV, University of Nebraska-Lincoln researchers have enhanced the safety and effectiveness of a potential vaccine for the virus that has killed approximately 35 million people during the past 35 years.

Device-associated infections due to biofilm-producing methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) have been recently associated with the failure of antibiotic treatment and decolonization measures. The goal of the study by Günther, et al. (2017) was to evaluate the extent to which the formation of biofilms influenced the efficacy of topical decolonization agents or disinfectants such as mupirocin (MUP), octenidine (OCT), chlorhexidine (CHG), polyhexanide (POL), and chloroxylenol (CLO).Bacterial killing in biofilms by the disinfectants and MUP was determined as the reduction [%] in metabolic activity determined by a biofilm viability assay that uses kinetic analysis of metabolic activity. The test substances were diluted in water with standardized hardness (WSH) at 25 °C at the standard concentration as well as half the standard concentration to demonstrate the dilution effects in a practical setting. The tested concentrations were: CHG 1%, 2%; OCT 0.1%, 0.05%; PH 0.04%, 0.02%; and CLO 0.12%, 0.24%. A test organism suspension, 1 mL containing ~1 × 109 bacterial cells/mL, and 1 mL of sterile WSH were mixed and incubated for six different exposure times (15 s, 1, 3, 5, 10 and 20 min) after the test substance was added.Additionally, the bactericidal effects of all substances were tested on planktonic bacteria and measured as the log10 reduction.The disinfectants OCT and CHG showed good efficacy in inhibiting MRSA in biofilms with reduction rates of 94 ± 1% and 91 ± 1%, respectively. POL, on the other hand, had a maximum efficacy of only 81 ± 7%. Compared to the tested disinfectants, MUP showed a significantly lower efficacy with <20% inhibition (p < .05). Bactericidal effects were the greatest for CHG (log10 reduction of 9.0), followed by OCT (7.7), POL (5.1), and CLO (6.8). MUP, however, showed a very low bactericidal effect of only 2.1. Even when the exposure time was increased to 24 h, 2% MUP did not show sufficient bactericidal effect.The researchers say their data provide evidence that OCT and CHG are effective components for disinfection of MRSA-biofilms. On the other hand, exposure to MUP at the standard concentrations in topical preparations did not effectively inhibit MRSA-biofilms and also did not show adequate bactericidal effects. Combining an MUP-based decolonization regimen with a disinfectant such as OCT or CHG could decrease decolonization failure.Reference: Günther F, et al. MRSA decolonization failure-are biofilms the missing link? Antimicrobial Resistance & Infection Control. 2017;6:32

It's an axiom of the infectious disease research community that wherever humans go, germs are likely to follow. Such is the case with the herpes virus family. There are two main strains, herpes simplex virus 1 and 2 (HSV 1 and 2). HSV1 is mostly transmitted by mouth, and seen most often in the common cold sores (affecting two-thirds of the world's population). HSV-2 is the main culprit of genital herpes (global prevalence of 11 percent), but has even been used to help verify the accepted ancient migrations of humans "Out of Africa" dogma that began about 80,000 to 50,000 years ago.

HIV is a master of disguise. The virus uses a shield of sugar molecules, called glycans, to hide from the immune system and block antibodies from attacking it. Now, scientists at the Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have developed a method to analyze the glycan shield on HIV's protective outer glycoprotein, developed as a potential HIV vaccine candidate.

Researchers have identified proteins that enable deadly malaria parasites to 'walk through cell walls' - a superpower that was revealed using the Institute's first insectary to grow human malaria parasites. The research has identified two parasite proteins that are the key to this superpower. The proteins could be targeted to develop much-needed antimalarial drugs or vaccines.

Ten semifinalists have been selected in the first phase of the Antimicrobial Resistance Diagnostic Challenge, a federal prize competition that will award up to a total of $20 million in prizes, subject to the availability of funds, for innovative rapid, point-of-need diagnostic tests to combat the emergence and spread of drug-resistant bacteria. The semifinalists were selected for their concepts for a diagnostic based on a technical and programmatic evaluation from among 74 submissions.  While semifinalists will each receive $50,000 to develop their concepts into prototypes, anyone can submit a prototype to compete in the second phase of the challenge to win up to $100,000.

When Chlamydia trachomatis infects a human cell, it faces a huge challenge: It must prevent the cell from triggering programmed cell death to prevent the bacteria from replicating and spreading throughout the body. Since numerous metabolic processes are either missing or fragmented in the pathogen, it is reliant on the host cell to supply the vital nutrients on a permanent basis.

Blood-sucking flies can act as 'flying syringes' to detect emerging infectious diseases in wild animals before they spread to humans, according to research published in the journal eLife. The discovery has significant implications for our ability to control the global outbreak of new and re-emerging infections such as the Ebola and Zika viruses.

Q:  Recently, I refused to process a device based on the following manufacturer’s instructions provided: “The xxx parts are made of durable aluminum and can be cleaned with ultrasound and any cleaning agents. Any standard sterilization technique is acceptable. There are no moving parts to maintain.” I contacted the company to alert them the instructions for use (IFUs) were insufficient. The company replied that “reprocessing is a different concept from cleaning and sterilizing a simple instrument for reuse.” They stated that the particular instrument in question “is a simple "instrument" like a retractor or a mallet. These instruments are reused; do not have critical "parts" that need to be retested between uses. They need to be cleaned and sterilized. It is a simple device with no moving parts or cavities or other complicating factors. How does one handle this?