Researchers have discovered an antibody able to neutralize all known variants of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, as well as distantly related SARS-like coronaviruses that infect other animals.

As part of a new study on hybrid immunity to the virus, the large, multi-institution research team led by The University of Texas at Austin discovered and isolated a broadly neutralizing plasma antibody, called SC27, from a single patient.

Nowadays, there's lots of buzz about spectacular new medical treatments such as personalised cancer therapy with modified immune cells or antibodies. Such treatments, however, are very complex and expensive and so find only limited application. Most medical therapies are still based on small chemical compounds that can be produced in large quantities and thus at low cost.

The bottleneck in the development of new molecular therapies is the limited number of new active substances that can be found using current techniques. A method developed in the 2000s at Harvard and ETH Zurich promises to provide a remedy: DNA-encoded chemical libraries (DEL).

Bayer and NextRNA Therapeutics, a biotechnology company focused on developing transformative medicines to address long non-coding RNA (lncRNA)-driven diseases, have entered into a collaboration and license agreement to develop small molecule therapeutics targeting lncRNAs in oncology. lncRNAs represent a vast class of therapeutic targets that recruit RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) to drive pathological processes across diseases. Disrupting lncRNA-RBP interactions with small molecules represents an innovative approach to develop a new class of therapeutic agents.

Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) introduced PfizerForAll, a user-friendly digital platform designed to make access to healthcare and managing health and wellness more seamless for people across the U.S. The new, end-to-end experience will support the millions of Americans affected annually by common illnesses like migraine, COVID-19 or flu, and those seeking to protect themselves with adult vaccinations. By bringing together critical resources and services into a single destination, PfizerForAll helps individuals and their families cut down on the time and steps needed to take important health actions like getting care, filling prescriptions, and finding potential savings on Pfizer medicines.

In the late 1960s, three Weizmann Institute of Science researchers developed several protein-like molecules, called copolymers, that they believed would produce a disease similar to multiple sclerosis in laboratory animals. The scientists - Prof. Michael Sela, Prof. Ruth Arnon and Dr. Dvora Teitelbaum - were surprised to discover that, instead of causing the disease, the copolymers cured it; one of these molecules became the widely-used drug Copaxone. More than half a century later, in a new study being published in Nature Cardiovascular Research,

Sodium chloride, commonly known as "table salt", was a valuable commodity in history. Today, table salt is cheap and indispensable in the kitchen. It is therefore not surprising that it has long since found its way into our everyday language - although not all expressions always bode well. However, the phrase “rubbing salt into the wound” could soon be given a positive twist, namely in cancer therapy.

In the past, cancer was usually a death sentence, but research has made considerable progress in recent decades and has significantly increased the survival time with a high quality of life for many types of cancer.

A next-generation COVID-19 mucosal vaccine is set to be a gamechanger not only when delivering the vaccine itself, but also for people who are needle-phobic.

New Griffith University research, published in Nature Communications, has been testing the efficacy of delivering a COVID-19 vaccine via the nasal passages.

Professor Suresh Mahalingam from Griffith's Institute for Biomedicine and Glycomics has been working on this research for the past four years.

Scientists are finding clues for how to treat diabetes and hormone disorders in an unexpected place: a toxin from one of the most venomous animals on the planet.

A multinational research team led by University of Utah scientists has identified a component within the venom of a deadly marine cone snail, the geography cone, that mimics a human hormone called somatostatin, which regulates the levels of blood sugar and various hormones in the body.

Artificial intelligence (AI) can help identify molecules that could serve as new drugs for mental health disorders. AI can be used to predict the three-dimensional structures of important receptors and thereby speed up the development of potential drugs. This is the result of a new study from Uppsala University published in Science Advances.

In drug development, experimental methods are often used to determine the three-dimensional structures of target proteins and to understand how molecules bind to them.

RNA interference (RNAi) therapeutics have garnered significant attention in clinical research due to their potential for treating various diseases, including genetic disorders, viral infections and cancer. These therapeutics can target and silence disease-causing genes with high precision, minimizing off-target effects and improving treatment outcomes.

As the number of RNAi-based treatment studies expands, questions about how long RNAi benefits can last and if it’s possible to fine-tune RNAi need to be answered.

Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE, "Pfizer") and BioNTech SE (Nasdaq: BNTX, "BioNTech") announced top-line results from their Phase 3 clinical trial to evaluate the companies' combined mRNA vaccine candidate against influenza and COVID-19 in healthy individuals 18-64 years of age. The combination candidate consists of Pfizer's mRNA-based influenza vaccine candidate with the companies' licensed COVID-19 vaccine. The Phase 3 trial measured two primary immunogenicity objectives (immunogenicity against SARS-CoV-2 as well as immunogenicity against influenza A and B), of which one was met.

A team led by Jose Onuchic at Rice University and Paul Whitford at Northeastern University, both researchers at the National Science Foundation Physics Frontiers Center at the Center for Theoretical Biological Physics (CTBP) at Rice, has made a discovery in the fight against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus responsible for COVID-19.

The team, in partnership with an experimental effort led by Yale University researchers Walter Mothes and Wenwei Li, has uncovered new insights into how the virus infects human cells and how it can be neutralized.

A fish on land still waves its fins, but the results are markedly different when that fish is in water. Attributed to renowned computer scientist Alan Kay, the analogy is used to illustrate the power of context in illuminating questions under investigation.

In a first for the field of artificial intelligence (AI), a tool called PINNACLE embodies Kay's insight when it comes to understanding the behavior of proteins in their proper context as determined by the tissues and cells in which these proteins act and with which they interact.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved neffy (epinephrine nasal spray) for the emergency treatment of allergic reactions (Type I), including those that are life-threatening (anaphylaxis), in adult and pediatric patients who weigh at least 30 kilograms (about 66 pounds).

"Today's approval provides the first epinephrine product for the treatment of anaphylaxis that is not administered by injection. Anaphylaxis is life-threatening and some people, particularly children, may delay or avoid treatment due to fear of injections," said Kelly Stone, MD, PhD, Associate Director of the Division of Pulmonology, Allergy and Critical Care in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.

The body has a veritable army constantly on guard to keep us safe from microscopic threats from infections to cancer. Chief among this force is the macrophage, a white blood cell that surveils tissues and consumes pathogens, debris, dead cells, and cancer. Macrophages have a delicate task. It's crucial that they ignore healthy cells while on patrol, otherwise they could trigger an autoimmune response while performing their duties.

Natural killer (NK) cells engineered to express interleukin-21 (IL-21) demonstrated sustained antitumor activity against glioblastoma stem cell-like cells (GSCs) both in vitro and in vivo, according to new research from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

The preclinical findings, published in Cancer Cell, represent the first evidence that engineering NK cells, a type of innate immune cell, to secrete IL-21 resulted in strong activity against glioblastoma, a cancer type in need of more effective treatment options.

Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) today announced positive top-line safety and immunogenicity results from substudy B of the ongoing pivotal Phase 3 clinical trial ( NCT05842967) MONeT (RSV I Mmunizati ONStudy for Adul Ts at Higher Risk of Severe Illness), evaluating two doses of ABRYSVO vaccine in immunocompromised adults aged 18 and older at risk of developing severe respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)-associated lower respiratory tract disease (LRTD).

The natural world is rich in chemical compounds with remarkable medicinal properties. A notable example is penicillin, discovered by chance from the Penicillium mold. This discovery revolutionized the treatment of bacterial infections and highlighted the potential of natural compounds in medicine. Since then, the identification, isolation, and synthesis of novel bioactive compounds from plants, fungi, and bacteria have become fundamental to drug development.

Novartis today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted accelerated approval for Fabhalta® (iptacopan), a first-in-class complement inhibitor for the reduction of proteinuria in adults with primary immunoglobulin A nephropathy (IgAN) at risk of rapid disease progression. This is generally defined as a urine protein-to-creatinine ratio (UPCR) ≥1.5 g/g(1). Fabhalta specifically targets the alternative complement pathway of the immune system.

By recruiting the immune system to combat tumor cells, immunotherapy has improved survival rates, offering hope to millions of cancer patients. However, only about one in five people responds favorably to these treatments.

With a goal of understanding and addressing immunotherapy's limitations, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis have found that the immune system can be its own worst enemy in the fight against cancer.