Immunology

Teixobactin Antibiotic Kills Pathogens Without Developing Resistance

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection has gotten a lot of attention. It is caused by a strain of staph bacteria that's become resistant to the antibiotics commonly used to fight it, but antibiotic resistance is not new. For as ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 9 2015 - 2:00pm

Fat Cells Under The Skin Help Protect Us From Bacteria

Maybe fat gets a bad rap. Immune responses matter but when it comes to skin infections, those response may depend greatly upon what lies beneath, according to a paper published in Science. Fat cells below the skin help protect us from bacteria, they write. ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 10 2015 - 10:00am

Hybrid 'Super Mosquito' Resistant To Insecticide-Treated Bed Nets

Interbreeding of two malaria mosquito species in the West African country of Mali has resulted in a "super mosquito" hybrid that's resistant to insecticide-treated bed nets. Anopheles gambiae, a major malaria vector, is interbreeding with i ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 17 2015 - 4:11pm

How To Boost The Immune System Of City Dwellers

It's not new that dwellers and cities are a little less hearty than rural cousins. There is even a hygiene hypothesis that says kids in the country get dirtier to their benefit and that wealthy, educated helicopter parenting and all those hand sanitiz ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 14 2015 - 9:00am

Superbugs: How Montezuma's Revenge Impacts Society Long After That Trip

If you are in the United States and travel to Mexico, you are cautioned not to drink the water, just like if you travel to Taiwan or China you are cautioned not to eat chicken bought from a street vendor; people are immune to some nasty stuff you probably ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 24 2015 - 8:11am

Avian Flu In Washington State Duck Not Deadly H5N1

Some media, such as the New York Daily News and NBC, have reported that the Asian H5N1 strain of highly pathogenic avian influenza has now entered the United States. This is incorrect and they were told it was not the same strain by the United States Geolo ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 25 2015 - 11:22am

Think Mosquitoes Bite You More Than Other People? Here's Why You May Be Right

There are up to 400 chemical compounds on human skin that could play a role in attracting mosquitoes. sookie, CC BY-SA By Cameron Webb, University of Sydney There’s always one in a crowd, a sort of harbinger of the oncoming mosquito onslaught: a person mo ...

Article - The Conversation - Jan 25 2015 - 11:40pm

Of The 3 Types Of Potential Malaria Vaccines, 2 Might Be Bad Ideas

By Joel N. Shurkin, Inside Science (Inside Science)- In nature — the rule goes — everything is connected to everything else, so it is possible that when you combine two methods of preventing a deadly disease, bad things can happen. ...

Article - Joel Shurkin - May 25 2015 - 11:04am

Skin Wounds: How Epithelial Cell Sheets Force Them To Close

Skin provides an essential protective barrier against foreign materials and pathogens and helps the body retain various fluids and electrolytes. When that barrier is damaged, the consequences can be devastating. Ulcers, bleeding and bacterial infections ma ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 9 2015 - 10:27am

What Was Sweating Sickness, The Plague Of The Tudors?

Don't look so worried Cromwell, she's just asleep. BBC/Company Productions Ltd By Derek Gatherer, Lecturer at Lancaster University. In the first episode of BBC historical drama Wolf Hall, based on Hilary Mantel’s novel of the same name, Thomas C ...

Article - The Conversation - Feb 10 2015 - 8:30am