A cluster of antibiotic-resistant bacteria called Campylobacter coli has been found in men who have sex with men (MSM) in Seattle and Montreal, researchers report in a new study. A cluster is a group of strains that are very closely genetically related. One of the bacterial strains appears to have acquired a new gene that made it able to resist…
Genes from a virus that was stitched into the human genome thousands of years ago are active, producing proteins in the human brain and other tissues, according to researchers at the University of Washington School of Medicine and the Laval University School of Medicine in Quebec, Canada. Their finding might help explain why people who inherit this “fossil virus” appear…
The path from student to researcher is not set in stone; most take the more traditional route where they choose a field during their undergraduate years and keep with it through master’s and Ph.D. degrees. Then, there are others who happen upon the field and, unsuspectingly, fall in love with it. Jennifer Stone, a research professor at the UW, falls…
The National Institutes of Health has not stopped violating a federal spending law on government animal research after an audit earlier this year found systemic transparency failures by the agency. Taxpayer watchdog White Coat Waste Project plans to file a complaint with the Department of Health and Human Services on Wednesday requesting an investigation into widespread violations of the Stevens…
Scientists at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle have developed a new strategy to counter the frustrating ability of HIV to sidestep vaccines designed to block it. It is a scheme that relies on one of the oldest tricks in the book for a fisherman: Use the right bait. “The kind of vaccine strategy that we are talking about…
Blood vessels are essential for human development and survival. Arteries, veins, capillaries and other types of vessels carry blood throughout the body, and with it, life-sustaining nutrients and oxygen required for the growth and repair of tissue, and for the maintenance of homeostasis. Blood vessel syndromes, like sepsis, or conditions associated with blood vessel functioning, like heart disease, can be…
In their quest to map the millions of neural highways and connections in the brain, researchers at the Allen Institute have made a significant step forward, unveiling a new high-resolution view of the wiring diagram of the mouse brain. Their study, which was published today in the journal Nature, traced thousands of connections between brain areas and lays the groundwork for…
The authors used a screen of genetically diverse mice infected with RNA viruses in combination with comprehensive pre-infection immunophenotyping to identify baseline immune correlates of protection from mortality to virus infection. They defined distinct T-cell correlates associated with survival following viral challenge. This study underscores the need for a protective immune response to be balanced in order to protect the host not only from uncontrolled virus replication but also from disease associated with robust immunity.
Scientists at Benaroya Research Institute at Virginia Mason (BRI) have received a $4.5 million, five-year grant from the National Cancer Institute to identify biomarkers that predict the success of checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy drugs used to treat certain types of cancer. Despite the success of checkpoint inhibitors at improving patient survival, they do not work in all patients and often have…
Within seconds after an infected mosquito bites, the malaria parasite navigates the host skin and blood vessels to invade the liver, where it will stay embedded until thousands of infected cells burst into the bloodstream, launching malaria’s deadly blood-stage infection. Now, for the first time, a team from Seattle Children’s Research Institute describes how malaria Plasmodium parasites prepare for this…
