Lifeboat Foundation

New research supported by the National Institutes of Health delineates how two relatively common variations in a gene called KIF3A are responsible for an impaired skin barrier that allows increased water loss from the skin, promoting the development of atopic dermatitis, commonly known as eczema. This finding could lead to genetic tests that empower parents and physicians to take steps to potentially protect vulnerable infants from developing atopic dermatitis and additional allergic diseases.

Atopic dermatitis is an inflammatory skin condition that affects up to 20% of children in developed countries. This chronic disease is characterized by dry, thickened and intensely itchy skin, particularly in skin folds. People with eczema are more susceptible to bacterial, viral and fungal skin infections and frequently develop additional allergic diseases such as asthma.

KIF3A is a gene that codes for a protein involved in generating signals from the outside to the inside of a cell, part of a complex sensory apparatus. Previously, scientists had identified an association between two genetic variations in KIF3A and asthma in children who also had eczema. In the new study, the researchers found that these variations, or single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), changed parts of the KIF3A gene to a form that can regulate, through a process called methylation, the rate at which a gene is transcribed into the blueprint for protein production. The investigators confirmed that skin and nasal-lining cells from people with the KIF3A SNP variants had more methylation and contained fewer blueprints for the KIF3A protein than cells in which KIF3A lacked the SNPs. In addition, the researchers demonstrated that people with the SNP-created regulating sites had higher levels of water loss from the skin.

Binary Defense researchers have identified a bug in the Emotet malware and have been using it to prevent the malware from making new victims.

New research into malaria suggests targeting enzymes from the human host, rather than from the pathogen itself, could offer effective treatment for a range of infectious diseases, including COVID-19.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) — Chinese government-linked hackers targeted biotech company Moderna Inc, a U.S.-based coronavirus vaccine research developer, this year in a bid to steal data, according to a U.S. security official tracking Chinese hacking.

China on Friday rejected the accusation that hackers linked to it had targeted Moderna.

Last week, the U.S. Justice Department made public an indictment of two Chinese nationals accused of spying on the United States, including three unnamed U.S.-based targets involved in medical research to fight the novel coronavirus.

Antibiotic resistance is an increasing health problem, but new research suggests it is not only caused by the overuse of antibiotics. It’s also caused by pollution.

Using a process known as genomic analysis, University of Georgia scientists found a strong correlation between antibiotic resistance and heavy metal contamination in an environment.

Jesse C. Thomas IV, an alumnus of the College of Public Health and the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, found commonalities in soils contaminated with heavy metals on the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site near Aiken, South Carolina.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved viltolarsen (Viltepso; NS Pharma) for the treatment of patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy amenable to exon 53 skipping, making it only the second FDA-approved therapy for this specific DMD gene mutation.

The agent from NS Pharma, delivered via weekly intravenous infusion, was granted accelerated approval via its priority review, fast track, orphan drug, and rare disease designations after its new drug application was accepted earlier this year. In March, NS Pharma launched an expanded access program for qualified patients.

The approval was granted based on findings from a phase 2 clinical trial (NCT02740972) and long-term extension study, details of which were recently published in JAMA Neurology. Among 16 participants age 4 to 9, significant drug-induced dystrophin production was observed in both viltolarsen dose cohorts (40 mg/kg per week: mean, 5.7% [range, 3.2–10.3] of normal; 80 mg/kg per week: mean, 5.9% [range, 1.1–14.4] of normal), with 15 (94%) patients achieving dystrophin levels greater than 2% of normal and 14 of 16 (88%) achieving levels greater than 3% of normal.

This video explains the details of eukaryotes, replication in eukaryotes and differences between prokaryotic DNA replication and eukaryotic DNA replication.

Malak Trabelsi Loeb

13-08-2020

Covid-19 did not only cause a health crisis around the world; It led to severe economic, social, and political challenges in various countries.

In response to the World Health Organization recommendations, governments imposed various precautionary measures in the course of managing its risks. Measures varied from mere social distancing to total lockdown and isolation in quarantine centers.

Continue reading “The Legal Industry and COVID-19 Challenges” »

The emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which causes severe respiratory tract infections in humans (COVID-19), has become a global health concern. Currently, several vaccine candidates against SARS-CoV-2 are in clinical trials but approval of these vaccines is likely to take a long time before they are available for public use. In a previous report, the importance of passive immunity and how immunoglobulin (Ig)G collected from recovered coronavirus patients could help in the protection against COVID-19 and boost the immune system of new patients was reported. Passive immunity by immunoglobulin transfer is a concept employed by most mammals and bovine IgG has a role to play in human therapy. IgG is one of the major components of the immunological activity found in cow’s milk and colostrum. Heterologous transfer of passive immunity associated with the consumption of bovine immune milk by humans has been investigated for decades for its immunological activity against infections. This short review focuses on passive immunity and how microfiltered raw immune milk or colostrum collected from cows vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2 could provide short-term protection against SARS-CoV-2 infection in humans and could be used as an option until a vaccine becomes commercially available.

Currently, different academic institutions and pharmaceutical companies worldwide have started programs to develop and test vaccine candidates against SARS-CoV-2 in clinical trials. An S-glycoprotein-based vaccine is a promising approach that has attracted the attention of scientists, since S-glycoprotein can be directly recognized by the host’s immune system. For the first coronavirus (SARS-CoV-1), which was identified in Guangdong province, China, in November 2002, different vaccines were developed and tested in animal models. Some of these vaccines prevented animal infection after challenge with SARS-CoV-1. Kapadia et al. showed that neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-1 could be detected in sera from mice immunized with S-glycoprotein of SARS-CoV-1 (10, 11).