Virus News and Research

Latest Virus News and Research

NPR begins series on polio eradication

NPR's "Shots" blog on Monday began a series of stories "reporting on the fight to eradicate the last few pockets of polio," which begins "with a look back at how the U.S. and the rest of the world wiped out the virus for good."

17 Oct 2012

Salk findings on cold virus proteins may spur new cancer treatments

Cold viruses generally get a bad rap----which they've certainly earned----but new findings by a team of scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies suggest that these viruses might also be a valuable ally in the fight against cancer.

17 Oct 2012

BioLineRx completes pre-clinical development of BL-8020 for HCV

BioLineRx, a biopharmaceutical development company, announced today that it has successfully completed the pre-clinical development of BL-8020, an orally available, interferon-free treatment for the Hepatitis C virus (HCV), and plans to commence a Phase I/II safety and efficacy study for BL-8020 in Europe during the first quarter of 2013.

17 Oct 2012

Offering methadone treatment to drug users significantly reduces HIV infection, transmission risk, study shows

Offering methadone treatment to people who use injection drugs "substantially reduces the risk that they will get HIV or give it to anyone else," according to a BMJ study published this month that pools data from studies done in nine countries, the New York Times reports.

17 Oct 2012

Hepatitis C rapid and point of care tests highly accurate and reliable

Timely screening and diagnosis is critical to the success of new treatments and ultimately to the survival of hepatitis C patients. A new study led by the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI MUHC) is the first to show that hepatitis C rapid and point of care tests with a quick turnaround time are highly accurate and reliable as conventional first-line laboratory tests.

16 Oct 2012

Roundup: Health care construction boom in Texas; Some Ga. schools, state authorities weigh leaving employee health plan

The Dallas-Fort Worth area is in the midst of an unprecedented health care building boom. You can see the most visible evidence in the Dallas medical district. There, several blocks apart, construction cranes signal more than $2 billion worth of new hospitals - the $1.27 billion replacement for Parkland Memorial Hospital and an $800 million replacement hospital at UT Southwestern Medical Center.

16 Oct 2012

Statins could be first preventive treatment for liver cancer

Statins may reduce the risk for hepatocellular carcinoma, show the results of a meta-analysis.

15 Oct 2012

Therapeutic HPV16 and HPV18 vaccine ‘may eliminate infection’

A candidate vaccine against human papillomavirus serotypes 16 and 18 appears to induce robust immune responses to antigens, potentially leading to the elimination of virus-infected cells and regression of dysplasia, say US investigators.

15 Oct 2012

AAPS recognizes top scientists in pharmaceutical sciences

During the Opening Session of the 2012 American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) Annual Meeting and Exposition, AAPS President David Y. Mitchell, Ph.D., presented the following ground-breaking researchers with awards commemorating their contributions to the pharmaceutical sciences:

15 Oct 2012

Comparing animal and human cancer is of mutual benefit

A diagnosis of cancer once spelled the end for our animal companions but the launch today of a specialty cancer clinic, led by one of Australia’s leading veterinary oncologists at the University of Sydney, offers new hope.

14 Oct 2012

Methadone treatment halves HIV risk

Methadone substitution can significantly reduce the risk for HIV transmission among people who inject opiate drugs, says a team of international researchers.

12 Oct 2012

Alverix receives FDA 510(k) clearance for new BD Veritor System kit

Alverix, Inc., a world leader in the design and manufacture of next-generation platforms for diagnostic Point-of-Care (POC) testing, today announced that BD Diagnostics, a segment of Becton Dickinson and Company, a leading global medical technology company, received 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for nasopharyngeal wash, aspirate and swab in transport media specimens on the BD VeritorTM System for Rapid Detection of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).

12 Oct 2012

New mechanism may alter principle understandings of molecular interactions within a cell's nucleus

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, with collaborators from Harvard University, the University of Madrid, Princeton University, and the University of Zurich, have discovered a new mechanism that may alter principle understandings of molecular interactions within a cell's nucleus.

11 Oct 2012

Feline leukemia virus becoming uncommon with lymphoma

Rates of feline leukemia virus in domestic cats with lymphoma have decreased in recent years, suggesting alternative etiologies for this cancer subtype, show German study results.

10 Oct 2012

Genocea raises $30M in Series C financing round

Genocea Biosciences, Inc., a clinical-stage company advancing innovative T cell vaccines for infectious diseases, has raised $30 million in a Series C financing round.

10 Oct 2012

U-M researchers to better understand HIV virus on a molecular level

A new $21-million grant will help researchers at the University of Michigan Health System better understand the HIV virus on a molecular level, potentially paving the way for new treatment approaches to AIDS and other diseases.

10 Oct 2012

Study examines trends in HIV mortality

Overall death rates due to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection declined over time between 1993 and 2007 for most men and women by race/ethnicity and educational levels, with the largest absolute decreases for nonwhites, but rates remain high among blacks, according to a report published Online First by Archives of Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication.

9 Oct 2012

Maths-based tool can quantify the spread and infectiousness of viruses

Mathematicians have developed a powerful tool to quantify the spread and infectiousness of viruses like the pandemic H1N1 flu strain, which can be used together with modern laboratory techniques to help the healthcare system plan its response to disease outbreaks.

9 Oct 2012

Treatment of hepatitis C can be successful in a prison population

Incarcerated individuals with chronic hepatitis C virus infection can be successfully treated with pegylated interferon and ribavirin, achieving similar rates of treatment completion and sustained viral response to that of infected individuals in the community, study results show.

8 Oct 2012

Trellis, OMT enter collaboration to generate human antibodies

Trellis Bioscience LLC and Open Monoclonal Technology, Inc. today announced a new collaboration where the companies will join forces to generate human antibodies against therapeutic targets identified by Trellis and its partners using OMT's OmniRat platform.

8 Oct 2012