Health Meaning

Brussels CureVac, a company based in Tübingen, Germany, which develops vaccines and RNA-based therapies, has won a prize of € 2 million granted by the European Commission to stimulate new vaccine technology that could help developing countries. A jury of experts said the research the company could lead to a new generation of vaccines that do not require refrigeration, a huge advantage in many poor countries where power and equipment are rare.

Most of the prize money will go to new research and a company party, but CureVac also plans to use some of it to build an exhibition honoring Friedrich Miescher, a Swiss scientist of the 19th century the discovery of the nucleic acids are not widely known.

The so-called price incentives have become more frequent in recent years; the idea is to raise a social, scientific or specific technology, and drive innovation to solve, without prescribing how. Unlike research grants, they are accessible to everyone, not only to bona fide academic and economic actors. The price of the vaccine, awarded at a ceremony held here on Monday, is the first time that the European Commission has adopted the idea. . There will be more such awards in 2020, however, the new 7-year research funding program of the Commission

The Commission launched the vaccine price to encourage innovators to solve the "chain cold "problem: According to the world health Organization, up to half of all vaccine doses are wasted worldwide, in part because they are not transported and stored at a constant cool temperature. Of the 12 teams that submitted a complete application, several focused on improving refrigeration systems. CureVac but claims it can eliminate this need while producing vaccines that are stable at room temperature for long periods of time.

The company develops immunotherapies for cancer and prophylactic vaccines against infectious diseases, both RNA-based molecules. The main idea is to code for an antigen as the RNA and which inject in the patient's skin, whose own cells then produce the protein that elicits an immune response, either to kill tumor cells or to prevent infection. The most advanced project of CureVac is a prostate cancer therapy is now in a clinical study of a second Phase II; a vaccine against rabies is in Phase I trials In November 2012, the company has also shown, as well as scientists from the Friedrich Loeffler Institute, the technology could lead to a new generation of vaccines against influenza.

CEO CureVac Ingmar Hoerr said E.Ü. Competition opened its eyes to the potential of RNA-based vaccines for developing countries. In its application, the company showed the degree of RNA-based vaccines are stable. Experiments have shown that even after being stored at 40 ° C for 6 months, the vaccine against rabies protected the animals against virus infection. "We did not know we had vaccines [with such potential], because we focus on the demands of Western countries," admits Hoerr.

Jury member Penny Heaton, vaccine development director at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said RNA technology CureVac had "the potential for a significant and positive impact on public health" in a statement released by the company on 10 March. Hoerr said that recognition gives the technology more credibility. "When we started the company, some people made fun of us, saying," [RNA] is an unstable molecule, I never think your data, it will never become a drug because it is so expensive, ' ". It reminds

"It is very encouraging that this prize fund seems to have succeeded in stimulating valuable innovative solutions," Helle Aagaard, politics and EU adviser advocacy for Médecins Sans Campaign to access to borders, said science Insider in an email. "But if these innovations will benefit the most needy children depend on how this technology develops and-critically-if it leads to, affordable and accessible vaccines tailored to the needs of the developing world," adds t- it.

Although most of the prize money of CureVac will go to basic research in molecular immunology, Hoerr said he also wants to reserve part to honor Miescher, the biologist Switzerland has identified nucleic acids, a family of key biological molecules including DNA and RNA, in his laboratory in Tübingen. CureVac has proposed reinstalling equipment in the 19th century Miescher laboratory in ancient Castle kitchen Tübingen, and open a public exhibition to highlight its scientific legacy. While James Watson and Francis Crick are considered the godfathers of DNA, Hoerr said, Miescher never received the credit that it deserved to isolate and analyze nucleic acids from pus cells.

Brussels A group of European pro-life organizations mobilizes against research embryonic stem cells in a way that the European Commission can not ignore. One of us, a so-called citizens' initiative, has collected 1.7 million signatures of all 28 E.Ü. Member States for a proposal that would block the funding of research in which embryos are destroyed; under E.Ü. rules, the European Commission must now consider turning the proposal into legislation

Research Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn will meet with the organizers of the initiative today. Thursday, they will defend their case during a public hearing in the European Parliament. The commission has until May 28 to spell his answer.

The proposal is a direct attack on a delicate compromise on the use of embryonic cells in research, a subject on which the union is strongly divided. "Every rear roll of the agreement would be a major step backwards for research into regenerative medicine, reproductive health and genetic diseases, and delaying the development of essential treatments for a host of non-treatable conditions," said a group 31 research institutes and universities across Europe today in a statement. the group, led by the Wellcome Trust, urged the Commission and the Parliament to reject the initiative.

European citizens' initiatives, a democratic novelty introduced in 2012, allow citizens to propose EU legislation, if a proposal gets at least 1 million verified signatures of seven or more Member States, the Commission must examine the transform in law. (One of Us is only the second to reach this threshold, the first called on the Commission to implement the human right to water and sanitation.)

E.Ü. the Member States have different regulations in the field of research on embryonic stem cells from very permissive, eg Belgium, Sweden and the UK, where the creation of embryos for research purposes is allowed very restrictive, such as Poland and Lithuania, where the research with embryonic stem cells is illegal.

regarding EU funding is concerned, Member States have agreed to disagree. Under the 7-year research program of the European Union 2020, which began this year, the union does not sponsor research that is illegal in the country where it would take place. In addition, the commission supports research activities that create human embryos for research purposes. But supporters of the initiative One of Us say that this provision is too lax; they argue that not E.Ü. money at all should go to activities which destroy human embryos research. This blocks funding for research on stem cells from leftover embryos from in vitro fertilization.

"The underlying dogma [the plea] is that as soon as the egg is [fertilized], there is a person who has a soul," said Charles Susanne, a biology and anthropology retired professor of the University of Brussels now studying bioethical issues. "Based on this principle, it is natural to reject abortion or research using embryos no more than 4 or 8 cells."

In its legislative proposal, One of Us refers to the 2011 decision of the European Court of Justice in a case known as the Brüstle v. Greenpeace, which said that the processes and products involving human embryonic stem cells are not patentable in the EU. The judgment "indicates that fertilization is the beginning of human life and in the name of human dignity excludes the patentability of any procedure that involves or necessitates the destruction of a human embryo," the organizers write. The EU should apply this principle in all, they argue.

Julian Hitchcock, a lawyer for the life sciences in the London firm Lawford Davies Denoon, said that this argument can not withstand legal scrutiny. The decision of the court was limited to biotechnology patents and can only be read as a general statement about where life and human dignity begin, Hitchcock said.

Under the E.Ü. Previous research program from 07 to 2013, the EU spent € 156.7 million on 27 cooperation projects in health research involving the use of human embryonic stem cells, a spokesman for the commission said. "Europe is currently a world leader in these competitive areas of research, and clinical trials are already underway arising from the research on stem cells," says the joint statement today by the scientific organizations. "Any measure restrict research using embryos threaten this position and prevent researchers in development of vital treatments for patients. "

observers say it is difficult to predict whether the Eropean Commission will reopen talks on his hard-earned accord. "at first, I hope not, because the decision has already been taken ... to keep the compromise" in 2020, says Susanne.

One of Us, which boasted the support of Pope Benedict XVI, said he has received about € 0,000 from three pro-life foundations in Spain and Italy over the last 2 years.

UK has proposed the removal of obsolete confidentiality rules that prohibit the dissemination of information on research animals.

under Article 24 of the animals 1986 (Scientific Procedures) Act, the Home Office can not disclose any information about the animal research in the country. This includes, for example, information about people or places that require testing on animals licensing and inspection visit reports. But these rules are now "out of step with the [government] policy on openness and transparency," said Minister Norman Baker Interior in a public consultation launched yesterday.

sharing information more openly "help provide a constructive dissemination of technical knowledge" and reduce the risk of duplication of experiments on animals, the government says.

two rights groups animal and researchers who use animals have praised the proposal as a step in the right direction. "freedom of access to information is ... the only way in which research can be properly examined to ensure the best possible outcome for people and animals, "the organization said animal rights people for the Ethical Treatment of animals in a statement today.

Chris Magee, head of policy at the advocacy group Understanding Animal Research (UAR) in London, tells science Insider that withholding information not allowed scientists and their work, because it leaves a "void that activists can fill misleading information." "Explain what is really going on inside laboratories is the best way to counter the sometimes hysterical claims of so-called activists for animal rights," says Wendy Jarrett, CEO of the organization. The secret is unnecessary because the threat of violent extremists is lower than it was in the 1980s and 190s, Magee said.

this month, RAU and more than 40 scientific organizations publish a joint document, or Concordat on how they intend to be more open and transparent about their research on animals.

private companies have welcomed the government's proposal, but sounded a note caution. Louise Leong, Director R & D policy of the British pharmaceutical industry Association, said in a statement yesterday that drug makers "would be looking for reassurance that amendments to this law does not jeopardize the safety of people who work in animal research ", as well as their intellectual property." commercially sensitive information "

The government's proposal seems to have taken these concerns on board: It suggests scrapping Section 24 while protecting the names of places, people and their intellectual property Under. preferred scenario the government, disclosure of research information on animals "with malicious intent" would also become a criminal offense.

Indeed, when the British government has proposed the repeal of Article 24 there are more than 10 years, then-Science Minister David Sainsbury said the biggest concern was "the question of sanctions for those who have evil that information in the public domain" and to take a firm stand against "animal terrorism."

In 04, the government finally decided to keep unchanged the rules. Now, observers expect Article 24 to the case, but do not know what will replace it. The public consultation ends on June 13; while the government says it will "work fast" to analyze the comments and propose a final option.

The National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the National Institutes of Health, revealed earlier this month it will gradually withdraw its colony of calorie-restricted rodents. Although most researchers who study aging will not be affected by the decision, some scientists will have to pay much more for the experimental mice, and some may be priced out of the ground.

In the 1930s, researchers first noticed that a very low calorie diet extends life of some animals. This scheme, known as calorie restriction (CR), also retards age-related diseases such as cardiovascular disease and cancer. For nearly 20 years, NIA has sponsored a colony of calorie-restricted rodents, which are available only to its beneficiaries. The price was right: Until this year, researchers paid $ 6 a month for the freshest age of the animal. And because of a rule change which came into force in January 2014, the rodents are now free.

Despite the low price, there is not much appetite for CR mice. Just eight to 10 researchers ask the animals of the colony each year, said Nancy Nadon NIA, chief of biological resources department. June 11, NIA announced it would not renew the contract with the company that hosts rodent, Charles River Laboratories in Wilmington, Massachusetts. "The way the use has changed in recent years," says Nadon, "it was not the best way to go about using funds from the NIA." (She had no estimate of what the maintenance costs of the colony.)

the decision will not exclude the access of researchers to CR mice immediately. New rodents enter the colony until 2018, so that older mice should be available in 2020. And NIA will continue to maintain a separate colony of aged rodents. If the NIA-funded researchers are desperate for CR animals, Nadon said it might be possible to transfer some of these mice at a reduced speed.

Few researchers are likely to miss the colony. Most scientists who rely on the CR rodents raise their own institutions, so that "for most researchers, this decision will not have any effect," wrote the gerontological researcher Valter Longo of the University of California South Los Angeles in an e-mail to S ciency Insider. in addition, the colony produces no sound scientific enough, said Roger McDonald, a physiologist and cell biologist who is on the point of retiring from the University of California, Davis.

Yet some researchers will be sad to see the colony will, although they understand the financial constraints of the NIA. "I think that it is a valuable and unique resource, and I hate to see that lost, "said Arlan Richardson physiologist at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center in Oklahoma City.

most affected will be researchers who can not raise their own CR animals, or "who are early in their career or just starting out in search CR" says Richard Weindruch, a gerontologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Vascular physiologist Anthony Donato of the University of Utah School of Medicine in Salt Lake City agrees. "They close the ability of some young researchers to pursue research of calorie restriction," he said. In large part, this is because of the often higher cost of raising CR mice yourself. He noted that the animals of the NIA, which was approximately 30 months, cost him about $ 0 to $ 130 each. But raise them in his university, which now plans to Donato, will run about $ 1 a day and the mouse will stay on the strict diet for more than 2 years. He can afford the higher cost, but other researchers can not.

Plans Another user of the CR settlement NIA, nutritional immunologist Elizabeth Gardner of Michigan State University in East Lansing, also rethink and budgets. She received the NIA mouse since the late 190s, using them for three or four projects, including a 2011 paper that showed calorie restriction reduces the ability of animals to recover from vaccines against influenza. Now, Gardner said, she intends to obtain age mouse animal colony of the NIA and calorically restrict itself, "but it will be more expensive."

Gerontologist Richard Miller of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, worries that the arrest colony CR omens shortages NIA colony of older rodents, which most scientists depend. Because NIA can not pay for the animals, it can not recover all the costs of providing. "I do not see how they [NIA] can afford to give the mice they used to sell," he said. It is concerned that NIA will also eventually have to reduce the number of animals it provides.

Federal scientists last week discovered a half dozen bottles of forgotten smallpox virus while cleaning an area storage on the campus of the National Institutes of health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. Smallpox or smallpox, which killed hundreds of millions before it was declared eradicated in 1980 through a vaccination campaign in the world, is legally registered in only two places in the United States and Russia.

The six vials of lyophilized virus, apparently in 1950, were found by a scientist from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on July 1 in a cold room which was originally part of an NIH lab, but he was transferred to the FDA in early 1970. the laboratory of the FDA moved to the main campus of the FDA, according to ABC News, NBC Washington, and a statement today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The vials were labeled as containing smallpox and were packed in a cardboard box with 10 other vials with fuzzy labels, reports ABC News.

NIH immediately placed the vials in a maximum containment laboratory in Bethesda and CDC notified of the discovery. Yesterday, a team of three CDC stole samples by government aircraft in Atlanta and transferred them to Biosafety Level 4 laboratory CDC, where screening overnight revealed that the six labeled as variola virus were positive for DNA smallpox. Further tests will reveal whether the virus can grow in culture, said CDC.

The bottles will then be destroyed, and if they contain viable virus the World Health Organization (WHO) will be invited to supervise the destruction. CDC Division of Select Agents and Toxins working with the FBI to investigate the origin of the samples. Smallpox is regulated as selection agent under US laws that require practical security and special security.

Most Americans born since 1972 have not been vaccinated against smallpox. Under an agreement with the WHO 1979 the only other official of the live variola stocks are kept at the CDC in Atlanta and the VECTOR laboratory in Novosibirsk, Russia. Every few years, WHO considers that these stocks should be destroyed. At a meeting in May, the WHO member again postponed a decision because some experts argued that the stocks are still needed for research.

Not smallpox vials were first time unexpectedly found in a laboratory. According to this article in 09 by the late bioweapons researcher Jonathan Tucker, after most of the smallpox stocks were moved to the two repositories, "[a] some scientific research centers have also reported finding and destroying vials containing the virus smallpox which was withheld accidentally in the laboratory freezers, raising fears that other poorly secured samples may exist that could fall into the hands of terrorists. "

last December, WHO is an advisory committee of smallpox has indicated that the organization was "finalizing arrangements for the destruction of variola virus cloned DNA fragments that have been stored in South Africa. "It is not known whether the fragments, which can be used for vaccine development, represented a serious threat to safety. Their destruction would have occurred this past January under the supervision of WHO.

In an earlier incident, forgotten smallpox samples were found in a laboratory in Eastern Europe in the 190s, former WHO official David Heymann told NBC Washington. Thomas Inglesby, director of the Center for security health at the University of Pittsburgh medical center in Pennsylvania, wrote in an e-mail to Science Insider he is not aware of other such discoveries: "My colleagues and ... I do not remember other times with discoveries like this. ... not to say that did not happen, but nothing that we know. "

Starving pregnant mice can cause changes in sperm of her son who apparently distort the health of her grandchildren children, according to a new study. The discovery provides some of the strongest evidence yet that the environment of the mother during pregnancy can alter the expression of the DNA in ways that are passed on to future generations.

A number of studies have suggested that environmental constraints in a parent can affect the health of future generations. For example, women who were pregnant during a famine in 1944 in the Netherlands known as the Dutch hunger winter had children and grandchildren who were abnormally small or prone to diabetes and the obesity. Animal studies have also found that stress to a parent, such as exposure of pregnant mice to toxic chemicals or slightly shocking mouse father to smell fear, may cause effects such as infertility or behavioral changes that persist for two generations or more can not be explained by genetic mutations.

Some scientists suspect that the effects are mediated by so-called epigenetic changes, chemical modifications of DNA that can turn genes on or off. A team led by geneticist Anne Ferguson-Smith of the University of Cambridge in the UK and diabetes researcher Mary-Elizabeth Patti of Harvard Medical School explored this idea by studying the DNA of two generations of mice descended from a mother undernourished.

researchers gave pregnant mice chow containing only half the calories they need during the last week of gestation, a time when crucial epigenetic patterns in the sperm of a male embryo is erased then reset. As the group of Patti had shown previously, this treatment resulted in the offspring and grandchildren who were underweight and prone to diabetes.

The group then examined the DNA of the sperm of the males born hungry mothers. Compared to control mice son, their semen had fewer chemical tags known as methyl groups on about 110 DNA segments. Often, methyl were missing the genes involved in the metabolism relatives who can play a role in obesity and diabetes. The expression of these genes was also altered in some body tissues.

However, although fetal tissues grandchildren mother mice also had similar changes in gene expression, surprisingly, the DNA in those tissues were not wearing these differences in methylation. This suggests that changes eventually disappear, the team announced today online Science . Ferguson-Smith thinks changes in methylation in the sperm son reflect the legacy of his under-nutrition in the womb, but because they do not persist, do not directly explain the disease grandchildren. Methylation brands "are not the long-term memory that connects one generation to the disease to another," she said.

"This is a beautiful study" linking the ancestral exposures epigenetic changes, "but I don 't say that the book is closed on how these things work," says epigenetics Oliver Rando researcher of University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. to show that these methylation patterns cause the health effects observed in the son of men and their offspring, must artificially turn on or off the suspect genes and show that this leads to the same result he said. "Disrupting the epigenome is the great challenge for the field."

in addition, the study does not rule out that the DNA methylation patterns are inherited from generations because researchers are not looking for them in the sperm of small-son says Rando.

Some are skeptical. Columbia University geneticist Timothy Bestor has "a number of issues" with the study. of these is that instead of studying inbred mice that are genetically identical, the researchers used a strain in which each mouse genetically variable. While this may have made the most similar mouse to the human population, it raises the possibility that in the womb, only fetal mice with a specific genetic makeup may have survived famine. Because the genetic also shapes methylation patterns, these genetic differences could be the reason why their sperm DNA methylation patterns different from those of control mice, Bestor said not because malnutrition directly modified patterns.

Scientists and the Government of Brazil disagree about whether the Amazon uncontacted tribes that came with the flu after making contact with the outside world last month received appropriate medical treatment. At least one scientist fears that the disease is just the beginning of a health disaster for the tribe and accuses the government of not taking fuller precautions before the tribespeople slipped into the forest.

According to new details disclosed by a senior official in the ministry of Brazil's Indian Affairs (FUNAI), the seven newly contacted tribes told an interpreter that they left their country of origin after coming under fire by non-Indians with guns. They first showed flu symptoms on 30 June, three days after their first meeting with government officials in the Brazilian village of Simpatia. The group then disappeared into the forest for 4 days.

vaccines against influenza When they finally reappeared in Simpatia 4 July, a government administered medical team. The officials then took the sick tribespeople at a remote border post and gave them six days of medical treatment. Finally, on July 11, they returned to their remote forest home, a village for up to 100 people.

After these medical interventions, those infected are safe for their isolated tribe. So wrote Carlos Travassos, Director of the General Coordination Unit FUNAI Loners and newly contacted Indians in July 22 email to Survival International, a nongovernmental organization based in London that supports tribal people.

But the anthropologist Kim Hill of Arizona State University, Tempe, said a health worker or an anthropologist would have been sent to people leaving for administering antibiotics for pneumonia likely and other secondary bacterial infections spread in the native village. Without properly administered antibiotics, Hill said, "third to half of the population will die" Based on the field work of his own and other anthropologists contacted with Amazon tribes, Hill said the flu victims are likely to infect. others in their tribe with foreign viruses, and other secondary bacterial infections take their toll on a population weakened. Travassos refused to talk to Science about it.

virologist Frederick Hayden of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville said that although he does not know the details of this case, it is generally believed that vaccines against the flu might do good. Although the plans are not effective treat the disease, they could protect the seven tribespeople of a future influenza exposure. Moreover, Hayden noted that early treatment of influenza antiviral drugs such as Tamiflu or Relenza, could "shorten the duration of illness and reduce the risk of infections of the lower respiratory tract. " Travassos, however, does not specifically mention such treatment in his email. According to Travassos, the FUNAI contact team gave hunters and gatherers from a primer in what influenza is, how it spreads, and what would happen if they did not return at the border the post Simpatia FUNAI or for medical treatment in case of new home. But Fiona Watson, research director for Survival International, said that the tribes may be too afraid to follow this advice. "Often, people associate tribal villages to host the infection," she said. "They think that the disease comes from there and they want to get out as soon as possible."

This reluctance to seek medical help outside may not bode well for those who acquire secondary respiratory infections, said Hill. in the mid 1980s, a group of tribespeople Yora who made contact with loggers in the region in the Amazon Peruvian were first infected with influenza and later came with pneumonia and other secondary infections. Without antibiotics, "the old people died and all the young children died," said Hill. A later study by medical anthropologist Glenn Shepard of Paraense Emilio Goeldi Museum in Belém, Brazil, found that nearly 300 people died, between 50% and 60% of the population.

An ethics committee organized by the World Health Organization (WHO) broke ground today when he said that the use of drugs or experimental vaccines not approved in the current Ebola outbreak is ethical assuming a set of criteria is met. There is a big problem, though: No experimental therapies and vaccines seems to be available in sufficient quantities to treat thousands in need. One of the issues to be discussed is how to fairly allocate scarce resources, the group said in a statement

Therefore another debate is preparing for some scientists and officials of public health: . What to try existing drugs that have been approved for other diseases but that could benefit patients and Ebola?

Several researchers have floated to try such drugs. An idea to try using statins and other, cheap widely used drugs created a "firestorm" this weekend after an op-ed piece project discuss the plan (which was submitted to The New York Times today) was distributed to some 80 researchers from around the world, said Thomas Geisbert, Ebola researcher at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.

Geisbert is squarely opposed to the idea because he said there was not enough evidence that the drugs would do any good. "I am very, very worried about it," he said.

But David Fedson, a retired pharmaceutical executive living in France who wrote the article in collaboration with Steven Opal of Brown University, said there are enough reasons to believe that some statins and other drugs such as ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers can save lives and should be tried. Fedson said nearly 30 scientists, including the most prominent, have agreed to co-sign the article.

in the view of Fedson, Ebola problem is not so much infection . the virus itself but a runaway immune response that also occurs in bacterial infection called sepsis statins and other drugs can mitigate this immune reaction; a trial in 2012 patients with sepsis showed that atorvastatin reduced the risk of progression to severe sepsis 83%. He says he wrote to the Assistant Director-General Marie-Paule Kieny about the idea; she replied in a detailed letter from the reserves of the agency, he said. Article op-ed is another attempt to get the issue on the international agenda.

But Geisbert think it's a terrible idea. Researchers should be able to show that any therapy taken to Africa has at least prevented death in monkeys, he said, and drugs that Fedson promote and Opal did not meet this criterion. "I understand that people want good, and we all want to do something," said Geisbert. "But I saw so many things that looked promising and did not work in rodents, or has worked in rodents, but does not protect monkeys. ... We do not just have to enter anything on the back burner "that is approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for certain uses.

compounds that modify the immune response could actually make a worse Ebola infection, Geisbert warns. And if drugs used in Africa today are ineffective, which could push the Ebola drug prospects as a whole, says Stephan Becker, a scientist at the University of Ebola Marburg in Germany. (Another veteran researcher Ebola Marburg, Hans-Dieter Klenk, said he signed the letter, though.)

Fedson said many scientists studying filoviruses like Ebola yet to catch the idea to treat the immune response. "All they can think about is hammering the virus," he said. (Fedson also lobbied for years for statins and other immunomodulatory agents accepted as a potential treatment during influenza pandemics.)

other scientists are trying to attract the attention of existing drugs as well. Eleanor Fish, a researcher at the University of Toronto in Canada, hopes to convince WHO and Médecins Sans Frontières benefits of Infergen use a synthetic interferon which she studied and has been widely used to treat hepatitis C and other diseases. Pharmunion BSV development, the Ukrainian company that makes it, offered to ship 60,000 bottles in Africa for free she said

fish has long studied the great antiviral properties of interferon α, and in 03, she used the patients infected with another virus outbreak, SARS;. a document it published in the Journal of the American Medical Association said it appeared to help. In an email she sent to officials at Médecins Sans Frontières and WHO yesterday, Fish cited two papers by researchers from the Canadian Public Health Agency, which suggest that it may help monkeys to survive an otherwise lethal dose of Ebola virus.

, but in these studies, interferon delivered by adenovirus was used in combination with a cocktail of monoclonal antibodies. Geisbert said mixing efficiency may be due to antibodies; previous studies that he and others have conducted found no effects on the Ebola virus to interferon itself, he said. The fish agrees there is no published evidence that interferon by itself can save monkeys.

Daniel Getts, scientific director of the Pharma Court in Chicago, Illinois, said he wrote the WHO suggest the use of nanoparticles Modifying Immune his company, designed to reduce tissue damage by immune cells called monocytes link. The agency rejected the idea; "They are only interested in therapies with primates data," he said.

Some researchers also see promising in two modulators selective estrogen receptor approved by the FDA one of them is used for treating breast cancer which have been shown to inhibit in vitro Ebola infection and in a mouse model in a 2013 document science Translational Medicine .

Fish said she realizes she is not alone in trying to attract the attention of the agency. "I guess people are probably down trees with all kinds of garlic therapies and who knows what," she said. While the WHO has the time and resources to consider all ideas unclear ; at a conference press on August 8, Director General Margaret Chan said his organization is "extremely tense" as is MSF WHO media office did not respond to emails from to. today Science Insider on the subject.

the epidemic shows no sign of slowing down. today, WHO reported that there were 1,848 cases up now and 1013 deaths, the actual figures almost certainly exceed that tally because some patients do not seek medical care

* Ebola files :. given the current Ebola epidemic, without precedent in terms of number of people killed and the rapid geographic spread, science and science Translational Medicine made a collection of research articles and news on the viral disease available for researchers and the general public.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has issued a statement saying that the problems related to the Ebola outbreak in Liberia are becoming more urgent.

Here is the full statement:

Situation in Liberia: unconventional necessary interventions

September 8, 2014

in the past weeks, a WHO emergency team of experts worked with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and members of her government to assess the situation in Liberia Ebola.

transmission of Ebola virus in Liberia is already intense and the number of new cases is increasing exponentially.

investigation team worked alongside the staff of the Ministry of Health, local health authorities, and other key partners working in the country.

All agreed that the Ebola epidemic requirements have completely outgrown government, AOS and partners, AO to meet. Fourteen of Liberia, aos 15 counties have reported confirmed cases.

Some 152 health workers were infected and 79 died. When the epidemic began, Liberia had one doctor to treat nearly 100,000 people out of a population of 4.4 million people. Each infection or death of a doctor or nurse depletes significantly response capacity.

Liberia, in collaboration with other affected countries, namely Guinea and Sierra Leone, is experiencing a phenomenon never seen in any previous Ebola epidemic. Once a new Ebola treatment facility is open, it immediately fills to overflowing with patients, showing a large but hitherto invisible workload.

Of all the Ebola affected countries, Liberia has the highest cumulative number of reported cases and deaths, amounting, on 8 September, almost two thousand cases and more than a thousand dead . The case fatality rate, 58%, is also among the highest.

Situation in Montserrado County

The WHO survey concentrated on Montserrado County, which includes Liberia, AOS capital, Monrovia. The county is home to more than a million people. The teeming slum of West Point, which has no sanitation, no running water and virtually no electrical equipment is located in Monrovia, and is adjacent to the city, AOS main market district.

In Montserrado County the team estimated that 1,000 beds are urgently needed for the treatment of patients infected with Ebola now. At present only 240 beds are available, with an additional 260 beds planned or being implemented. These estimates indicate that only half of the urgent and immediate capacity needs could be met in the coming weeks and months.

The number of new cases is moving much faster than the ability to manage in the treatment of specific Ebola centers.

for example, an Ebola treatment facility, improvised by WHO for the Ministry of Health, has recently been set up to handle 30 patients, but were more than 70 patients since it opened .

The WHO estimates that 0 to 250 medical staff are required to handle Ebola treatment plant safely with 70 beds.

The investigation team saw conditions in general purpose health facilities and transit and specific Ebola treatment.

The John F Kennedy Medical Center in Monrovia, which was largely destroyed during Liberia, AOS civil war, remains the country, AOS as academic referral hospital. The hospital is plagued by fires and electrical floods, and several medical staff there were infected and died, exhausting the hospital, AOS limited further effective.

The fact that the first symptoms of Ebola virus disease mimic those of many other common infectious diseases increases the likelihood that the Ebola patients will be treated in the same room as patients with other infections, if putting and medical staff as well at very high risk of exposure.

In Monrovia, taxis filled with entire families, some of whom are thought to be infected with Ebola, crisscross the city, looking for a treatment bed. There are not any. As WHO staff in Liberia confirmed, no free beds for Ebola treatment exist throughout the country.

According to a member of the WHO staff who were in Liberia for several weeks, motorcycle taxis and regular taxis are a hot source of the potential for transmission of Ebola that these vehicles are not disinfected all, much less before new passengers are taken on board.

When patients are discharged in Ebola treatment centers, they have no other choice but to return to their communities and homes, as they inevitably infect other, perpetuating constantly pushed higher in the number of cases.

other urgent needs include finding shelters for orphans and help patients who were rejected by their families or neighbors recovered.

last week, WHO has sent one of its most experienced emergency managers at the head of the WHO office in Monrovia. The coordination between the key partners is improving rapidly, in order to better match resources and rapidly escalating needs.

survey Implications

The survey in Liberia gives three important conclusions that need to shape the Ebola response in countries with intense transmission.

First, Ebola control conventional interventions are not enough impact in Liberia, even if they seem to work elsewhere in areas of limited transmission, especially in Nigeria, Senegal and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Second, much community involvement is the cornerstone of a more effective response. When communities support, especially in rural areas, and develop their own solutions and protective measures, the Ebola transmission slowed considerably.

Third, the main development partners supporting the response in Liberia and elsewhere should be prepared to step up their current efforts in three to four times.

As WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan told agencies and officials last week in New York and Washington, DC, the development partners must prepare for, Äúexponential Increase, Au in Ebola case in countries experiencing intense virus transmission.

Several thousand new cases are expected in Liberia over the next three weeks.

WHO and its Director General to continue to advocate for more treatment beds Ebola in Liberia and elsewhere, and held the world has to respond to this absolutely urgent with its unprecedented dimensions of human suffering

* Ebola files :. given the current Ebola outbreak unprecedented in terms of the number of people killed and the rapid geographic spread, science and Science Translational Medicine have a collection of items research and news on the viral disease available for researchers and the general public.

A move by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to regulate the diagnostic tests developed in thousands of laboratories is picking up steam Fire and drawing. The agency recently informed Congress that it plans to regulate some of these so-called laboratory developed tests (LDT) -which, unlike tests marketed by diagnostic manufacturers currently do not require FDA approval. FDA has not yet issued draft guidelines on the matter, but at a hearing yesterday, members of the House of Representatives Health Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee has raised questions about the authority of the agency to regulate these tests, motivation to do it, and potential impact of these regulations on the diagnostics industry.

Doctors use diagnostic tests to determine which patients are at risk of developing a disease that could benefit from treatment. And while companies offer FDA-approved kits for many of these uses, clinical laboratories often design and deliver their own. According to the American Clinical Laboratory Association (ACLA), more than 11,000 laboratories are allowed to develop and execute LDT, and the majority of them do.

FDA the power to regulate all LDT and in vitro diagnostics -since 1976, said Jeffrey Shuren, FDA's Center director for Devices and Radiological Health, at the hearing. But the agency has so far exercised "discretionary authority" and did not require the production of these laboratory tests seek approval. Labs were instead regulated by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services through 1988 Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA).

But LDT are not what they were, Shuren said the subcommittee. They are manufactured in large quantities and are increasingly removed from health care centers and doctors who command them. They are also increasingly complex, relying on sophisticated software to interpret the results. Although CLIA ensures that laboratories perform testing correctly, it does not address the clinical validity of the test itself, how accurately it measures the state of a patient. "We have a responsibility to provide more certainty patients," said Shuren.

This is why the FDA for years to regulate fishing LDT and is currently developing draft guidelines for laboratories to seek his approval. The new requirements would not apply to all tests. Those that the FDA considers "low risk", those who diagnose rare diseases, and those who have no FDA-approved equivalent would continue to enjoy a freedom of execution. But for the rest, laboratories will submit data proving their validity. But he does not yet know how many laboratories would be subject to new requirements.

Some lawmakers and stakeholders balk at the idea of ​​greater involvement of the FDA. Alan Mertz, president of ACLA and a witness at the hearing, argued that the proposed regulations would discourage laboratories to develop new innovative tests and prevent timely resolution of testing new uses. Mertz, and several representatives also challenged the FDA's authority to regulate LDT, arguing that they are "devices", but rather the services provided to a patient, and are already regulated under CLIA effectively.

But others welcome the initiative of the FDA to raise the regulatory bar. Christopher Newton-Cheh, a cardiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston who testified on behalf of the American Heart Association, called the current system "completely opaque." Doctors are often unaware if the test they order is FDA approved, and inaccurate results increase the risk that patients will undergo unnecessary treatment or be excluded from treatment based on misinformation. "This is the right thing to do for patients" he said.

FDA may waive its draft guidelines on or after September 29. once the agency finalizes the direction it intends to phase in the new process review over 9 years.

Ebola virus devastation in three countries in West Africa today forced the United Nations Security Council to convene its first never emergency meeting to discuss a public health crisis. It was unanimously adopted a resolution that declared the spread of the virus a "threat to international peace and security" and called on the world to send more workers and health care supplies in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, and not to isolate the country.

Several speakers stressed that the epidemic is particularly tragic because the three countries have made considerable progress in their development in recent years.

US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power, who chaired today's meeting, noted that the resolution had 130 co-sponsors, more than any precedent in the history of the Security Council .

The following are excerpts from speeches by Power and others

Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary General :.

"the seriousness and scale of the situation now requires a level of international action unprecedented for health emergencies. ... Leaders of the affected countries requested the Organization of UN to coordinate the global response. We are committed to doing what is necessary to the required speed and scale ...

this unprecedented situation requires unprecedented measures to save lives and preserve peace and security. therefore, I decided to establish a United Nations health mission combining strategic perspective of the World health Organization with a very strong logistics and operational capacity. This international mission, to be known as the United Nations Mission for Ebola or UNMEER emergencies, will have five priorities :. stopping the epidemic, treatment of infected people, providing essential services, preserving stability, and prevent further epidemics "

David Nabarro, main coordinator of the United Nations system for Ebola virus disease:

" There is a growing epidemic at an exponential rate. ... The doubling rate is about every 3 weeks. ... The answer increases more as a line speed, so if you had a chart, it would look like a straight line. What this means is the epidemic accelerates away from the control effort. ... The challenge is to ensure that all these different offers [for support] are effectively coordinated with a powerful platform that allows everyone to work in the safe area and not get themselves infected virus. ... What is absolutely vital, Madam President, is a very big tent, because it requires the world to come late on countries and people behind them to get a quick result. "

Margaret Chan, director -general of the World Health Organization:

"This deadly Ebola virus and feared before us in a home as fast moving described by Dr. Nabarro continues to deliver one surprise after another. Now we have to catch the most urgent and pragmatic as possible. ...

This is probably the biggest challenge in peacetime the United Nations and its agencies have had to face. None of us experienced in containing outbreaks ever seen in our lives emergency on this scale with this degree of suffering and the magnitude of the consequences cascade . ... In some regions, hunger has become an even greater concern than the virus. ... Everything is now unprecedented. Everything now is faster than ever. the need is great and we know it "

Niamah Jackson, the assistant of a doctor in an Ebola treatment center in Monrovia run by Doctors Without Borders

". One day this week, I sat outside to eat my lunch processing center. I met a boy who broke through the gates. His father had died of Ebola it a week ago. I saw the blood in his mouth. We had no space. We could not take it in. ... When he turned away, he entered the city, and I thought, this guy is going to take a taxi and he will go home and infect their families. ...

Please send your helicopter, your center, your bed, your staff and experts. But we must also know the basics. There are still houses in Monrovia that lack of soap, water, and buckets. Even these simple things can help stop the spread of the virus.

The future of my country is in the balance. ... We do not have the capacity to respond to the crisis on our own. If the international community does not stand up, we will be destroyed. We need your help. We need it now "

Samantha Power, US Ambassador to the United Nations:

". Looking away will not remove it. One of the main reasons for this epidemic is dramatically propagated is that so far we have not come together enough to face it. ... Isolation is effective and necessary to treat people who may have been exposed to Ebola, it is quite against-productive when applied to whole countries. It deprives them of the same resources they need to bring the virus under control. So when the governments of the region say more than 70 investigators from the disease if they travel to infected areas to volunteer, they will not be allowed to return to their own country, they not only put the country currently affected to a greater risk, but also their own country.

Today, instead of isolating the affected countries that we call for them floods, flooding with the resources that are desperately needed to turn the tide in this struggle. ... If today's resolution is not followed by action on one year scale and scope proportional to the virus, this resolution will be referred to from now on as proof that we have raised the hope that we do not deliver sure. "

* Ebola files: Given the current Ebola outbreak unprecedented in terms of the number of people killed and the rapid geographic spread, science and science Translational Medicine made a collection of research and news articles on the viral disease available for researchers and the general public.

Senga Omeonga comes from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), the country that had the first recognized outbreak of Ebola in 1976 and where the virus was discovered. Omeonga, a doctor, has also received training Ebola in DRC, but saw its first case this summer in Monrovia, Liberia's capital, where he has lived for the past 3 years.

And Omeonga, who worked at the hospital, not a specialized treatment center contracted Ebola Catholic St. Joseph of the disease itself. It was one of a handful of people in the world to receive zmapp, an experimental antibody cocktail.

The family of Omeonga lives in Canada, and when he fell ill, he has no roommates. On 24 September, he spoke with Science experience, including his suspicions about how he was infected, and the devastating epidemic now Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. The following is a revised version of that conversation and subsequent e-mails that clarified some details

Q:.? Why do you think that so many health care workers have been infected

has: There's a lot we need to learn. From my own experience, it is really the lack of protective equipment in our hospitals in Liberia. At this point, we begin to have more. At first there was not enough to protect us as health workers.

There were also problems with the patients we receive. Many of them were lying when they come to the hospital. They do not even tell you that they are having fever. They said they fell or were on a motorcycle, or somebody pushed them, or they went to work and distributed. Sometimes you put a patient on a table to evaluate and find different symptoms

Q:.? Do you have personal protective equipment (PPE)

A: I got protective equipment, PPE light we use in the outpatient department. We had a surgical gown, gloves and a face mask. No boots. I had all short gloves and they were some days not really fitting

Q:.? How are you do you think that become infected

A: I had to deal with a patient who was initially negative and we were her treatment, and there was no improvement. They requested a second test and it came back positive after 10 days. I have been exposed to the patient daily. PPE with light. I do not think I have enough protection in hospital. Somehow I'm contaminated by touching

Q:.? Have you had fluid you press

A: It is difficult to say. He was a patient he had diarrhea and vomiting wet. Probably somewhere, I touched it. When he was declared negative, I am sitting in his room to talk to him and be near him. I do not really remember direct contact. Maybe these days when it was almost abandoned. Everyone was afraid to touch him. He was shouting. I removed his nasogastric tube and he was fighting. I had my face shield and mask.

Maybe it was in the beginning when I was sitting in his room. Sometimes I had just a T-shirt. I do not know. There are many questions. Every day, I always think, "When I am contaminated"

Q: Why did you single the patient

A: I saw three patients were positive. Unfortunately, they are all dead. After seeing the first two, I was quarantined, and I went in 21 days and was not infected

. Q:? When were you diagnosed as positive for the Ebola virus

has: I began to feel the symptoms on the second of August, Saturday . high fever, vomiting, and weakness I do not have diarrhea It continued for 5 days before collecting the sample At that time, the country had one of Ebola treatment unit.. [ETU] [at the ELWA 2 hospital] they were really overwhelmed and it was really difficult to find space even for me as a physician it was on Friday that they collected the sample...; Saturday, I learned I was positive and was taken to ETU at ELWA 2.

Q: You were home sick for the week?

A: Yes. The house is located just behind the hospital. It was a plus for me, because I had access to drugs, and nurses and people from the pharmacy helped. I had oral rehydration salts and medicines to stop vomiting. By day, the weakness was deteriorating. In the first 3 days I am able to manage, but after that, I need help

Q:.? Have you been in denial

A: Three days before my symptoms started, they came to pick up the patient to the hospital and take him to ETU. Everyone who has picked up, everyone was worried. We all lived in the compound. They were watching us for 21 days. We all got our body temperatures. I have not checked my temperature because I was so scared. When I started to have fever, I knew I was infected

Q:.? Other people you work with infected by a patient even Were

A: Yes, the person who probably infected us all was the director of the hospital, Brother Patrick Nshamdze, who sadly passed away on August 2 In total, two brothers, a Spanish priest, sister, two nurses, X-ray technology, a lab technician, and a social worker died. Two other doctors, two sisters, and an orthopedic technology survived. They closed the hospital after the outbreak

Q:.? Did you think you were going to die

A: Yes. The only thing that was going to happen to my death. I talked with my wife and kids and we talked and talked and talked. They were very worried. They prayed for me, encouraging me. It was a great support. I prayed me. I was positive thoughts and began to say even if it was 10% chance for recovery I want to be among the 10%

Q :. You received zmapp. Do you think it made a difference

A: I think it helped, but I can not say for sure. When I went to the Ebola treatment center, I was quite a bit stable. I was walking. I'm not like the other patients who were very sick. I vomit or have diarrhea. My own antibodies plus zmapp helped me a speedy recovery. I have had three doses and unfortunately I had a severe reaction to the drug on the third dose. I think it was a medical error: I do not get the allergy medication before they should give minimize side effects

Q:.? How come you been selected to receive zmapp

A: I do not really know. I was the luckiest. At that time, there were three doctors who have been infected. And I think they have given to the Liberian government zmapp for physicians. A doctor came into my room and said that we zmapp for three doctors. Here's how I happened to get

Q:.? Do you feel healthy now

A: I feel very good. I still have symptoms, like my joints having a little pain every day. And weakness is disappearing. I'm about 75%. I feel much better. I'll go back to work when I am fully recovered

Q :. There is a possibility that people who have had the disease immunity. What do you think

A:. I think I'm protected now for the strain I had, but we still need to protect ourselves

Q: do you work in an ETU

a: I do not mean I do not want to work in an ETU. But I really like the EPP. It is very uncomfortable and I do not think I can handle it. I am not afraid. I have my immunity, but I continue to take precautions

Q:.? What do you think of the idea of ​​having people who have recovered from Ebola aid to patient care

A: Today, we talked to the doctor responsible for ELWA 2, about this idea because there is an acute shortage of staff. It need not be health workers. non-health workers can be trained, and those who recovered can be very useful as assistants patients. They can give food and water and help the patient. The idea was well received, but he needed to discuss with the Ministry of Health and see if it is willing to sponsor such a program and hire these people

Q:.? What will happen now in Liberia

A: right now, the situation Monrovia, contact tracing, simply forget. They are already lost. There are a lot of contacts in the community, we do not even know. Patients go to treatment centers and because there is a shortage of beds, they return to the community and continue to infect people. We are overwhelmed. No one makes contact tracing.

When they came to me and did tests, nobody asked my contacts. I am a doctor. I have had many patients that I treated. There are too many cases and they do not know the contacts. They are there in the community goes on the market and schools and everything.

We only hope with the help of the international community, the US government and other governments and NGOs [nongovernmental organizations], it will be controlled. If we rely on the Liberian government, the situation is getting worse and it will be disastrous. There are not enough human and financial resources.

For a story on the risk of infection with Ebola virus for health workers here.

* Ebola files: Given the current Ebola epidemic, unprecedented in terms of the number of people killed and the rapid geographic spread, science and science Translational Medicine made a collection of research articles and news on the viral disease available for researchers and the general public.

Eighteen adults with a serious eye disease that were among the first to receive transplants created from human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) still do not have apparent complications with the cells introduced after an average of almost 2 years, according to the latest status report on their health. vision tests also suggest the view of more than half of the subjects had improved, but others have expressed reservations about these results. However, the result may pave the way for transplants derived ocular cells of stem cells called photoreceptors, which could significantly improve vision in people with eye disease if all goes according to plan.

Eye diseases such as age-related macular degeneration, as well as a genetic disease called macular dystrophy Stargardt that afflicts young people-are considered excellent candidates for stem cell therapy because the eye is an immune privileged site, meaning the transplanted cells are not as likely to be rejected as abroad compared with grafts elsewhere. (Volunteers in these trials nevertheless received immunosuppressants for 12 weeks as a precaution.) Such treatment could, in theory, to repopulate the eye with cells which were destroyed, helping to restore lost sight. But there are many obstacles: Among them, enough cells growing in a Petri dish and ensure that they connect to "existing machinery" in the eye, said Hendrik Scholl, who co- directs the Center for stem cell and regenerative medicine Ophthalmic at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. There have also been security problems facing all hESC studies, including concerns that embryonic stem cells could proliferate out of control.

Today's report, which appears in The Lancet , follows another in the same group in early 2012. Then a team led by Robert Lanza, chief scientist in Chief technology Advanced cell Inc. in Marlborough, Massachusetts, and his colleagues published the first results ever clinical trial using human embryonic stem cells. This study indicated that the first two patients, both legally blind, had suffered no ill effects from the cells.

Now Lanza and Steven Schwartz, who heads the division of the retina at the Jules Stein Eye Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, and colleagues to share details from initial studies in two different eye diseases. They describe the results on nine people with macular degeneration and nine with Stargardt's age. The volunteers, aged 20 to 88 were injected in their retina of a particular type of cells in the eye, the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) cells, which were derived from hESCs in the lab. RPE cells have some great benefits for the first hESC Security Studies: Because they are pigmented, they can be tracked. They are also relatively easy to grow, manipulate and control in the laboratory. The downside is that people with these eye diseases lose sight largely because they lose another type of eye cells :. Photoreceptors sensitive to light in the retina

However, the test results offer hope to the distance. After surgery, 13 of the 18 patients had increased pigmentation, suggesting that the transplanted cells have done their work. The authors also reported that 10 patients reported some improvement in their vision, Lanza said was an unexpected result. "In the best case, we thought we could hopefully prevent vision loss in these patients," he said, because the RPE cells are known to help maintain existing photoreceptors in part by digesting debris cell they lose. "We did really expected such a dramatic improvement," says Lanza. He suspects that the transplanted cells are actually restore photoreceptor function "dormant".

However, improvements not correlate with the additional amount detected pigment researchers, Lanza and is careful to point out that, for ethical reasons, the study had no control group that received the transplanted cells without surgery.

Scholl is optimistic that the transplanted cells still appear safe and said that the analysis of cells in the eyes of the recipients are "in fact an indication that something is happening. "The" small signal "this improved vision in this cohort could be because the remaining photoreceptors" are exposed to a healthy environment, "he believes. Or it could be due to cataract surgery many patients in the study received, or the challenges of measuring the vision to start. . Yet Scholl added, RPE cell transplantation "can not be" for these patients, because ultimately they need new photoreceptors to restore vision

Some groups, including Lanza that seek to do exactly it. transplant photoreceptor cells early data show that these cells derived from hESCs, have "an amazing ability" to migrate into the retina and restore vision, Lanza said. But they are more difficult to grow in the laboratory and tests are currently limited to animals. In the long term, it is hoped that the injection of these cells could make a huge difference to people whose sight is disappearing or have already disappeared.

If there is one thing that the malaria parasite will, it is to penetrate into the bowels of a mosquito. Once there, it releases hundreds of giant cells which enter the human body through a blood-bite. Now scientists have found a way to make the mosquitoes less welcoming to this pathogen, and one that causes dengue. Stacking the gut of the insect killer with microbes that destroy the invaders before they have a chance to cause disease

Like humans and most other animals, mosquitoes are stuffed with microbes that live on and inside them-their microbiome. By studying the microbes that make their house mosquitoes, the researchers met one called Chromobacterium sp. (Csp_P). They already knew that the relatives of Csp_P were able to produce potent antibiotics, and they wondered if Csp_P could share the same talent.

The team Csp_P grown in a solution of sugar in the blood and fed two concoctions mosquitoes whose natural microbiomes had already been eliminated with doses of antibiotics. As scientists hoped, Csp_P quickly took on the mosquito gut after being ingested through the sugar solution and even faster when it was fed to them in blood. In another experiment, made with mosquitoes that are not pretreated with antibiotics, fed Csp_P mosquitoes have received blood containing dengue virus and Plasmodium falciparum , a single-celled parasite that causes type the deadliest malaria. Although many of the mosquitoes died days after being infected with Chromobacterium , pathogenic malaria and dengue were much less able to infect mosquitoes that survive, reports the team today in the PLoS Pathogens . That's good news :. If the mosquito is infected with pathogens, it is less likely to be able to transmit pathogens to humans

The team of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, also exposed the malaria parasite and dengue virus to Csp_P laboratory cultures to test anti- Plasmodium and dengue activity. Again, they found that bacteria inhibit the growth of pathogens.

The researchers say there could be two mechanisms by which Csp_P fights infections Plasmodium and dengue. First, because Csp_P is toxic to mosquitoes, it activates the immune system of the insect. This has the collateral benefit to stave off infection Plasmodium and the dengue virus, which otherwise would have thrived in the mosquito gut. But that's not all, 'said George Dimopoulos, parasitology at Johns Hopkins, who led the research team. Because the bacteria also sniffs Plasmodium and the dengue virus in the laboratory, it means Csp_P is the production of toxic compounds which kill pathogens.

Dimopoulos and his colleagues believe Csp_P could be used to "inoculate" mosquitoes against pathogens of malaria and dengue fever, perhaps through the use of baited traps sugar which are already used to spreading insecticide in pest populations. This would have the dual effect of killing most mosquitoes while severely limiting the ability of survivors to spread the disease. This double whammy is "a unique property" for all malaria control agent, said David Fidock, a microbiologist at Columbia University, who was not involved in the study. "No current agent fight against malaria does both."

Csp_P could also play a more direct role in the fight against malaria and dengue fever in humans. Because the compounds it secretes kill pathogens in the laboratory, these toxins could be turned into drugs to treat malaria and dengue fever in people.

Tanjore Balganesh, medicinal chemist who runs the Open Source Drug Discovery program in Bangalore India for diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis neglected, is skeptical, however. Because Csp_P is so toxic to Plasmodium , the dengue virus, and even the mosquito that carries them, there is a good chance it could be harmful to human cells, too, he said . This is not a death blow to this line of investigation, however. "It's still early [for this research]," he said, "but no drug discovery program without problems."

What is the best recipe to create specific stem cells to patients? The issue has generated years of debate and a series of contradictory documents. Ideally, the cells must develop into any cell type as well as those of a natural embryo do. For now, 7 years, the method for introducing a small set of genes in adult cells to create so-called induced pluripotent stem (iPS) dominates the field. But some researchers have stuck with an older stem cells approach to a donor nucleus into an unfertilized egg and derived from the embryo. This technique of nuclear transfer of somatic cells (SCNT) is expensive, technically difficult and heavy ethics on several fronts. But proponents argued that the cells created in this way are higher, in part because iPS cells can mature cells retain characteristics and could acquire a greater number of genetic changes in the reprogramming process. The latest research on the issue, published this week in Cell Stem Cell , examines the genetic characteristics of two types of cells and declared a tie.

This may surprise some people, because the researcher who led the work, Dieter Egli of the New York Stem Cell Foundation (NYSCF) in New York, has long been a nuclear transfer promoter. He gave an overview of the document on October 22 at the annual conference of the foundation. "This means that anyone working on iPS cells probably work with cells that are actually very good. So I have good news for you ," he told them, sparking murmurs and laughter . "What this means exactly for SCNT program, I do not know yet." Indeed, some longstanding champions of nuclear transfer Egli included-aren't ready to give up yet the method.

The discovery in 06 by Shinya Yamanaka and colleagues as inserting a few genes into mature cells could behave like immature revolutionized the field of stem cells. Labs have since refined the technique to create patient specific cells to study disease and have already started clinical trials cells derived from iPS cells to restore damaged or diseased tissue.

But some questioned whether this genetic approach to reprogramming created change himself unwanted carcinogenic mutations. "We were very worried," said Nizar Batada, a cancer biologist at the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research in Toronto, Canada. He co-authored a 2011 paper Nature showing that iPS cells had more genetic abnormalities that skin cells used to obtain them. "You have a normal cell sitting around, waiting to be a skin cell, and blasting you with genes, so there is chaotic change in DNA replication and gene expression. " Other methylation studies of DNA-adding chemical markers that control gene expression in some places-has suggested that iPS cells were some memory of their past, as adult skin cells, by example, and may be less effective to differentiate into new cell types.

Some scientists thought that the nuclear transfer method used to clone Dolly the sheep in 1996, created stem cells that are less sensitive to these issues. But there was a catch: As Yamanaka in 2012 shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with John Gurdon for nuclear transfer, SCNT nobody has used to create human stem cells, and the attention of the field had largely moved to iPS cells. Last year, a team led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov of Oregon Health & Science University in Beaverton finally declared success with SCNT in human cells, and the debate was revived.

Egli and colleagues wanted to know if the newly available cells really benefits held over iPS cells. Until now, most studies comparing the two methods have a common defect, Egli said: They start with derived from different donor cells. possible genetic differences between individuals make it difficult to say how reprogramming techniques change nuclear DNA.

Egli and colleagues instead used skin cells from two-a newborn and an adult to create both the SCNT stem derived cells (using donor eggs) and iPS cells. They then compared the two types of cell lines with the original cells of the skin in terms of genetic mutations, changes in gene expression, and differences in DNA methylation. Both methods resulted in about 10 mutation with respect to the average genome mature cell source. These changes do not necessarily occur during reprogramming, however, says Egli. Many were probably present in the original skin cells, and some might have arisen in the handling of cells before they have been reprogrammed.

The two types of stem cells also paid a similar amount of methylation changes. Overall, the method does not seem to matter, Egli and his team concluded. Because he is a longtime supporter of SCNT, Egli said he was "more attractive" to reveal significant differences between the two types of stem cells. "This is just not what we found."

The study says nothing about whether the changes documented in the two cell types make it less fit for use in research or therapy, Batada rating, or even if the observed mutations affect the gene activity. "That these aberrations have any function is not clear," he said, but in terms of methods of creation of two stem cells, "they are just as good or just as bad."

Mitalipov, who also contributed to the Cell Stem Cell paper, argues that nuclear transfer creates more stable cells that more closely resemble embryonic cells. It published research this summer reports that methylation patterns in nuclear transfer cells more closely mimic natural embryonic stem cells, and the ongoing work to identify other benefits.

Izpisúa Juan Carlos Belmonte, a developmental biologist at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, California, is the lack of differences between the two types of stem cells surprising. But this study is "probably not enough to settle this issue," he said. "There are and will always be the safety concerns [of stem cells] regardless of the method," he adds, and there is "no reason so far to discredit one for the other."

Both Egli Mitalipov and plan to continue their work on nuclear transfer and protect its value. Egli points out that research has led to other important discoveries, including technology that could allow a woman to prevent the transmission of mitochondrial diseases in children using an egg donor. And it suggests that donors of eggs-based therapies can be an easier path to regulatory approval. Until the two types of stem cells leads to an approved therapy, Egli said, "I think it would be a big mistake to put all eggs in one basket"

Humans have used antibody therapies to treat infectious diseases for over 100 years. The blood plasma of the survivors of influenza administered to patients in 1912 may have contributed to their dramatic turnaround. In the years that followed, the immune proteins of the survivors were administered to infected people in an attempt to fight against diseases such as Lassa fever, SARS and even Ebola.

It is difficult, however, to find survivors who can donate plasma containing these lifesaving immune proteins. Now a team led by researchers at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) in Frederick, Maryland, used genetically cows to produce large quantities of human antibodies against hantavirus engineering, an often fatal disease transmitted primarily rodents to people. In animal models, at least, these antibodies provide robust protection against the virus, opening the door to therapies to treat and prevent Hantavirus, for which there is no cure. The technique of bioproduction also holds promise for generating antibodies against other infectious agents.

The work is preliminary and needs to be tested in people, but the team called a "proof of concept" that human antibodies can be grown in animals and retain activity against the disease.

"I am personally very excited about it. I think it has potential for the treatment of patients with hantavirus infection, "says Greg Mertz, an infectious disease specialist at the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, who was not involved in the research . "If we extrapolate this to other diseases, there where this approach could be promising."

The USAMRIID researchers led by virologist Jay Hooper, teamed with SAB Biotherapeutics in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, using genetically cows, when presented with an antigen, could produce fully human polyclonal antibodies against both the hantavirus strain Sin Number, first isolated from the Four Corners region of the southwest of satays and the Andes hantavirus strain that is prevalent in Chile. there, it infects an average of 55 people a year and kills about a third of them. After a long incubation period and a few days of fever and pain muscle, the virus attacks the lungs and often causes acute respiratory failure leading to death. There is no cure and experimental vaccines would be logistically difficult to use, even if they have passed clinical trials.

Creating human antibodies in an animal model is no small feat. Scientists combined parts of the human chromosome 14 and human chromosome 2 - bits that are needed to produce antibodies - in an artificial chromosome implanted in cows. The genes responsible for producing antibodies of the cow were silenced. Accordingly, cattle produced immune cells that spew human antibodies.

The DNA vaccines of then administered scientific experimental hantavirus against the Andes strains and Sin Nombre, cows "of transchromosomal". Within a month, the animals produced liters of high concentration of human antibodies against both strains. The scientists then extracted the immune proteins and used to treat hamsters who had been fatally infected with hantavirus. The treatment increased the survival of hamsters significantly, saving seven of eight infected Chilean hantavirus strain, while eight controls are dead, the team reports online today in Science Translational Medicine . Five of the eight hamsters infected with Sin Nombre strain were saved.

Animal models do not always translate to humans, but in this case, the research team is optimistic. non-human antibodies, for example, birds and primates have been safely administered to people in the past, and human antibodies should prove safe in 1 clinical trial phase, said reproductive physiologist Eddie Sullivan SAB Biotherapeutics, who led the development project transchromosomal the cows. And he suspects that the antibodies cease to function in humans. If anything, they can work better because they will be able to communicate with human immune cells most commonly, he said. "We expect that the antibodies are likely to be very well tolerated in humans and will respond similarly," says Sullivan.

Of course, nothing is certain. In very rare cases, some antibody therapies previous actually helped viruses replicate in cells in serving as a bridge to host cells. "in order to really complete the proof of concept clinical studies in humans showing the need for security to carry out" Hooper said. "If this material proves to be as easy to produce as it seems, and it is safe, I think it's a great, great way to move forward."

Scientists are also studying USAMRIID cut bovine intermediate and just give hantavirus vaccines directly to people. However, antibody therapies are actually more practical in some respects. In diseases such as hantavirus, when so few people are infected each year, a large-scale vaccination program might not make much sense, especially economically, said Hooper. Having a few doses of antibodies on hand to treat the unlucky few infected people could solve the problem without the need to vaccinate huge sections of the population. In addition, Sullivan noted, one cow may produce antibodies against different strains in abundant amounts, up to 1000 human doses per month.

A huge challenge for any potential treatment for hantavirus is to find a way to diagnose the disease in time. Infection is difficult to recognize before it moves to the lungs, at which point it is often too late. Having an available supply of hand hantavirus antibodies could allow health workers to administer treatment for people who have been in contact with an index case, said Mertz.

Again, the potential benefits still hinge on clinical trials that demonstrate the safety and efficacy; the team is optimistic that they could begin next year for hantavirus, and perhaps even earlier for other diseases. "We work on Ebola and also MERS-CoV," Sullivan said.