News archive
Omicron: A weak point found
Tuesday, 25 January 2022 14:36Using human cell cultures, a German-British research team succeeded in showing that omicron viruses are less effective than delta viruses in inhibiting the cell's own immune response by the messenger interferon. This may contribute to the observed lower pathogenicity of the omicron variant in patients.
Cancer research with animal-free methods at the University of Würzburg
Tuesday, 25 January 2022 11:53The Foundation to Promote Cancer Research at the Julius Maximilians University of Würzburg (JMU) supports cancer research projects using state-of-the-art methods. Among other things, the development of a personalized in vitro tumor model is planned, and signaling pathway analyses, machine learning methods, as well as artificial intelligence, will be used.
Tübingen: Immuno-competent choroid on the chip
Monday, 24 January 2022 21:46Researchers from the Organo-Lab at the University of Tübingen, Germany, have developed an immuno-competent choroid on-chip model based on human cells. The model enables the study of drug-induced toxicity reactions in the eye or inflammatory diseases of the choroid such as uveitis and wet age-related macular degeneration.
Patient study: Alzheimer's aggregates develop in different parts of the brain
Monday, 24 January 2022 10:33An international team of researchers led by the University of Cambridge has discovered new findings on the development of Alzheimer's disease in a patient study.
PEI: Zika virus may prevent antiviral immune response
Wednesday, 19 January 2022 08:56A team of researchers led by the Paul Ehrlich Institute has studied the interaction between the Zika virus and the antiviral restriction factor tetherin.
Reproductive crisis in cancer research
Sunday, 09 January 2022 13:46Eight years ago, the Reproducibility Project: Cancer Biology (RP: CB) was started. The goal was to replicate the results of top cancer laboratories. Looking at high-ranking research articles from 2010 and 2012, the team has now come to a sobering conclusion: The reproducibility of the work is less than 50%.
Severe covid progression due to upgraded T cells
Tuesday, 04 January 2022 12:53German researchers have found a particularly active form of immune cells in patients suffering from severe COVID-19. The so-called CD16-positive T cells have an increased cytotoxic effect, among other things on the inner cell layer of blood vessels. This could explain the severe courses of Covid-19.
United States: Bipartisan bill to end cosmetics testing on animals introduced
Tuesday, 14 December 2021 13:12Together, Republican and Democratic representatives have reintroduced the so-called Humane Cosmetics Act in the Senate. The bill would end the testing of cosmetic products on animals and ban the sale of products developed through animal testing throughout the United States.
Antiviral protein ZAP inhibits the proliferation of SARS-Cov-2
Tuesday, 14 December 2021 10:05Scientists at the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), Würzburg, and the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), Braunschweig, have found an immune defense protein that can inhibit the proliferation of SARS-CoV-2 by a factor of 20.
Soft X-ray tomography: new, fast method for investigating viral infections
Thursday, 09 December 2021 13:32Viral pathogens such as the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 alter individual cell components but can provide information about how viral diseases develop. Scientists from the University of Heidelberg have found a new, powerful imaging technique: Soft X-ray Tomography (SXT). They used it to examine cell cultures from kidney and lung tissue infected with SARS-CoV-2.
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Menschen für Tierrechte - Tierversuchsgegner Rheinland-Pfalz e.V.