News

There is a continuous search for new, safe and relatively cheaper drugs with the advent of new diseases and increasing antibiotic resistance. Endophtyes having the potential to synthesize a wide array of bioactive compounds is an attractive alternative. They have the potential not only to synthesize plant metabolites but also a host of other natural products exhibiting a broad spectrum of structural and chemical diversities exhibiting biological activity and therefore can serve as lead molecules for designing new drugs

Congenital cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection can cause serious complications such as hearing difficulties and mental retardation in affected infants. A Japanese research team has discovered a new method for predicting congenital CMV infection during the prenatal period. This method is safe for both mothers and fetuses, and could potentially be adopted for general use. The findings were published on October 20 in the online version of Clinical Infectious Diseases.

As Zika spreads throughout the world, the call for rapid development of therapeutics to treat Zika rings loud and clear. Taking a step further in identifying a possible therapeutic candidate, a team of researchers at Duke-NUS Medical School (Duke-NUS), in collaboration with scientists from the University of North Carolina, has discovered the mechanism by which C10, a human antibody previously identified to react with the Dengue virus, prevents Zika infection at a cellular level.

A group of researchers at the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) and the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) in Barcelona, Spain, has developed a new technology that sheds light on the HIV infection and offers a first glance at the expression landscape of the HIV in the human genome.

More than 2 million people got infected by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in 2015, being sexual transmission the main channel of infection. Researchers from the Infections of the Respiratory Tract and in Immunocompromised Patients group of the Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL), led by Dr. Daniel Podzamczer, have evaluated the speed at which a new antiretroviral drug, Dolutegravir, is able to reduce the viral load in semen, an area of the body considered to be a reservoir of the virus and where access for drugs is more difficult. The results, published in Journal of Infectious Diseases, show the potential of these new treatments to reduce the chances of sexual transmission of the virus.

Healthcare professionals are hesitant to administer the flu vaccine to pregnant women, despite the potential life-saving benefits, according to a UBC study. The study also shows that pregnant women who were eager to get vaccinated had difficulties because health professionals turned them away.

Research on the mosquito-borne Rift Valley fever in east Africa and the Arabian Peninsula shows that current surveillance systems are unable to detect the virus in livestock before it spreads to humans. A coherent policy is needed to combat the viral disease, which has the potential to spread to previously unaffected areas, according to studies at Umeå University in Sweden.

Today, it is no longer acceptable to think that employees learn much from a training session.  So often both trainer and trainees are so busy, preoccupied, or bored that attending a training session may be a more detrimental time and energy suck than not having one. That is, except if your facility, your employer, or you are thinking outside of the proverbial (soap)box.

Researchers have developed a new mouse model that could be used in Zika research to better understand the virus and find new treatments, according to a study published in PLOS Pathogens.

Researchers have found a strong association between El Niño-Southern Oscillation conditions in the Pacific to observed weather and dengue epidemics in Sri Lanka. According to a study published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, el Niño activity -- measured in sea surface temperature in the pacific -- impacts rainfall and temperatures in Sri Lanka and thus contributes to exacerbated dengue epidemics six months later.