The best way to prevent influenza is by immunization. Unlike vaccines for polio and measles, which confer life-long immunity, the influenza vaccine protects for only one year. Influenza virus undergoes antigenic variation, necessitating annual production of a new vaccine. Is it possible to formulate an influenza vaccine that protects against all virus strains for life? Two studies …
The treatment of AIDS patients with a combination of three or four antiviral drugs is known as HAART, or highly active antiretroviral therapy. Combination therapy has been effective for long-term control of infection, and represents one of the high points in AIDS research. The downside of HAART is that strict adherence to daily therapy must …
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2008 was awarded to Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie, and Roger Y. Tsien for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP. Dr. Chalfie’s contribution was to show that GFP could be used as a genetic tag by producing the protein in the transparent roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans. Who …
In episode #21 of This Week in Virology, Vincent, Dick, and Alan are joined by Max Gottesman, who has researched viruses of bacteria – bacteriophages – for many years. They discuss an unusual wasp-virus symbiosis, influenza transmission and absolute humidity, how mosquitoes survive Dengue virus infection, and bacteriophages. Click the arrow above to play, or …
The entry of HIV-1 into lymphocytes requires two cellular proteins, the receptor CD4, and a co-receptor, either CXCR4 or CCR5. Individuals who carry a mutation in the gene encoding CCR5, called delta 32, are resistant to HIV-1 infection. This observation was the basis for giving an AIDS patient a bone marrow transplant from a donor …
The cute guinea pig returns for another installment on why influenza is prevalent during winter months in temperate climates. We previously discussed work by Palese and colleagues in which a guinea pig model for influenza virus transmission was used to conclude that spread of influenza virus in aerosols is dependent upon temperature and relative humidity. They found …
