Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog

Category: biotech/medical

Bats are the second most diverse mammalian group, playing keystone roles in ecosystems but also act as reservoir hosts for numerous pathogens. Due to their colonial habits which implies close contacts between individuals, bats are often parasitized by multiple species of micro-and macroparasites. The particular ecology, behavior, and environment of bat species may shape patterns of intra-and interspecific pathogen transmission, as well as the presence of specific vectorial organisms. This review synthetizes information on a multi-level parasitic system: bats, bat flies and their microparasites. Bat flies (Diptera: Nycteribiidae and Streblidae) are obligate, hematophagous ectoparasites of bats consisting of ~500 described species. Diverse parasitic organisms have been detected in bat flies including bacteria, blood parasites, fungi, and viruses, which suggest their vectorial potential. We discuss the ecological epidemiology of microparasites, their potential physiological effects on both bats and bat flies, and potential research perspectives in the domain of bat pathogens. For simplicity, we use the term microparasite throughout this review, yet it remains unclear whether some bacteria are parasites or symbionts of their bat fly hosts.

Bats are the second most diverse mammalian group after rodents, with ~1390 recognized species across 227 genera (1). Many bat species play keystone roles in ecosystems, where they are essential to pollination, seed dispersal, and pest control (2). Several studies have also highlighted their prominent role as pathogen-reservoirs (3, 4); viruses being the best studied due to their potential as human pathogens (3, 5 – 8). Bats host more viruses per species than rodents, making them an interesting system for both disease ecology and public health research (4, 9).

Bacteria (such as Bartonella spp. and Borrelia spp.) and protozoans (such as Trypanosoma spp. and Plasmodium spp.) have also been detected in bats (8, 10, 11). In recent years, bat-associated Bartonella genotypes have been found in humans, indicating the public health importance of this parasite in bats (12 – 14). Bartonella and other pathogen transmission from bats to humans may occur through religious activities in caves, bat consumption or contact with contaminated products (12, 15). There are documented cases of bat-specific ectoparasites biting humans (16, 17), increasing the potential of bat-born pathogen transmission. Additionally, bat-associated pathogen, such as Trypanosoma cruzi genotype has also been found in humans (18).

Read more | >

MIT anthropologist Amy Moran-Thomas reflects on the deep connection between planetary and human well-being.

When anthropologist Amy Moran-Thomas first went to Belize to begin ethnographic research in 2008, she planned to chronicle human health concerns, focusing on diabetes. Then she learned that local diets contributing to such chronic conditions were changing, in part due to losses in ocean food webs, and kept hearing stories about how local plants were in trouble.

“Listening and trying to learn from what people were saying, over the years I came to see human health and planetary health as deeply interconnected,” says Moran-Thomas, the Morrison Hayes Career Development Associate Professor of Anthropology at MIT. “When I think of health now, I think of disarray in bigger ecosystems and infrastructures that’s also landing in human bodies.”

Read more | >

The next big event on the tech show calendar is almost upon us. The CES 2021 kicks off on Monday, 11th January and runs for four days. Last year it was held just ahead of the Covid-19 pandemic wave, so ended up being one of the last physical exhibitions covered by the tech press. This year it will be somewhat reduced and virtual only. However the organisers, the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), have already been booking venues for 2022 having faith in the various vaccines being able to provide enough personal safety for a hybrid event.

In 2020 the CES show attracted 171268 attendees, including 6517 members of the media, to promotional venues stuffed by 4400 exhibitors. In 2021 expect these numbers to be scaled down. We do have important keynotes and presentations from the likes of AMD, Nvidia, and Samsung to look forward to but the online-only event will feature a relatively small 1000 exhibitors. Being online will open up ‘attendance’ more widely though, with almost the same number of fold expected to take part in the show this year as last (estimated to be 150000 visitors in 2021).

Read more | >

Before the century is out, advances in nanotechnology, nanomedicine, AI, and computation will result in the development of a “Human Brain/Cloud Interface” (B/CI), that connects neurons and synapses in the brain to vast cloud-computing networks in real time.

That’s the prediction of a large international team of neurosurgeons, roboticists, and nanotechnologists, writing in the journal Frontiers in Neuroscience.

A Human Brain/Cloud Interface, sometimes dubbed the “internet of thoughts”, theoretically links brains and cloud-based data storage through the intercession of nanobots positioned at strategically useful neuronal junctions.

Read more | >

Biochemists use protein engineering to transfer photocaging groups to DNA.

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is the basis of life on earth. The function of DNA is to store all the genetic information, which an organism needs to develop, function and reproduce. It is essentially a biological instruction manual found in every cell.

Biochemists at the University of Münster have now developed a strategy for controlling the biological functions of DNA with the aid of light. This enables researchers to better understand and control the different processes which take place in the cell – for example epigenetics, the key chemical change and regulatory lever in DNA.

Read more | >

Scientists from Russia and Switzerland have probed into nanostructures covering the corneas of the eyes of small fruit flies. Investigating them the team learned how to produce the safe biodegradable nanocoating with antimicrobial, anti-reflective, and self-cleaning properties in a cost-effective and eco-friendly way. The protection coating might find applications in diverse areas of economics including medicine, nanoelectronics, automotive industry, and textile industry. The article describing these discoveries appears in Nature.

Scientists from Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU, Russia) teamed up with colleagues from University of Geneva, The University of Lausanne, and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich for an interdisciplinary research project during which they were able to artificially reproduce the nanocoating of the corneas of fruit flies (Drosophila flies) naturally designed to protect the eyes of the insects from the smallest dust particles and shut off the reflection of light.

The craft of nanocoating meets demands in various fields of economics. It can wrap up any flat or three-dimensional structure, and, depending on the task, give it anti-reflective, antibacterial, and hydrophobic properties, including self-cleaning. The latter, for example, is a very important feature for expensive reusable overnight ortho-k lenses that correct the eyesight. Similar anti-reflective coatings are already known though created by more complex and costly methods. They are being used on the panels of computers, glasses, paintings in museums can be covered with them in order to exclude reflection and refraction of light.

Read more | >

Ralph Baric, PhD, is the William R. Kenan, Jr. Distinguished Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. He is a Harvey Weaver Scholar from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and an Established Investigator Awardee from the American Heart Association. In addition, he is a World Technology Award Finalist and a fellow of the American Association for Microbiology. He has spent the past three decades as a world leader in the study of coronaviruses and is responsible for UNC-Chapel Hill’s world leadership in coronavirus research. For these past three decades, Dr. Baric has warned that the emerging coronaviruses represent a significant and ongoing global health threat, particularly because they can jump, without warning, from animals into the human population, and they tend to spread rapidly.

The Baric Lab uses coronaviruses as models to study the genetics of RNA virus transcription, replication, persistence, pathogenesis, genetics and cross-species transmission. He has used alphavirus vaccine vectors to develop novel candidate vaccines. Dr. Baric has led the world in recognizing the importance of zoonotic viruses as a potentially rich source of new emerging pathogens in humans, with detailed studies of the molecular, genetic and evolutionary mechanisms that regulate the establishment and dissemination of such a virus within a newly adopted host. Specifically, he works to decipher the complex interactions between the virion and cell surface molecules that function in the entry and cross-species transmission of positive-strand RNA viruses.

In 20172018 and 2019, Dr. Baric was named to Clarivate Analytics’ Highly Cited Researchers list, which recognizes researchers from around the world who published the most widely-cited papers in their field. Also in 2017, he was awarded a grant for more than $6 million from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) to accelerate the development of a promising new drug in the fight against deadly coronaviruses, which is currently in clinical trials to reverse COVID-19 disease in humans. In this collaboration, he continued his partnership between the Gillings School and Gilead Sciences Inc. to focus on an experimental antiviral treatment that he had previously shown to prevent the development of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) in mice. The drug also was shown to inhibit MERS-CoV and multiple other coronaviruses (CoV), suggesting that it may actually inhibit all CoV. He continues to work with this drug.

Read more | >

Some 21 residents of a Bat Yam retirement home tested positive for the coronavirus after they were vaccinated but before they had developed antibodies, according to Ynet.

The other 150 residents of the home will be tested for the virus.

Health officials have stressed that the two-dose Pfizer vaccine regimen means that the vaccine is only fully effective about five weeks after the first dose. This means it could take until sometime in February for enough elderly and high-risk people to be vaccinated to help lower the spread of infection and start reopening the economy.

Moreover, the risk of catching coronavirus after the first jab has been confirmed in that some 15000 patients who received the first dose of the vaccine were screened and 428 were confirmed positive for COVID-19 and some 12 people were hospitalized, according to reports. It is possible that some of them were exposed to the virus even before being vaccinated.

On Friday morning, Israel’s one millionth citizen was vaccinated against the novel coronavirus in the presence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Health Minister Yuli Edelstein.

Read more | >

#JustAReminder why knowing the origin of this disease is so important. Shi Zhengli who ran the lab in Wuhan worked with Ralph Baric on this gain of function research.

Declan Butler.

12 November 2015

An experiment that created a hybrid version of a bat coronavirus — one related to the virus that causes SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) — has triggered renewed debate over whether engineering lab variants of viruses with possible pandemic potential is worth the risks.

In an article published in Nature Medicine 1 on 9 November, scientists investigated a virus called SHC014, which is found in horseshoe bats in China. The researchers created a chimaeric virus, made up of a surface protein of SHC014 and the backbone of a SARS virus that had been adapted to grow in mice and to mimic human disease. The chimaera infected human airway cells — proving that the surface protein of SHC014 has the necessary structure to bind to a key receptor on the cells and to infect them. It also caused disease in mice, but did not kill them.

The findings reinforce suspicions that bat coronaviruses capable of directly infecting humans (rather than first needing to evolve in an intermediate animal host) may be more common than previously thought, the researchers say.

But other virologists question whether the information gleaned from the experiment justifies the potential risk. Although the extent of any risk is difficult to assess, Simon Wain-Hobson, a virologist at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, points out that the researchers have created a novel virus that “grows remarkably well” in human cells. “If the virus escaped, nobody could predict the trajectory,” he says.

Lab-made coronavirus related to SARS can infect human cells.

Read more | >

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) — Mexican authorities said they are studying the case of a 32-year-old female doctor who was hospitalized after receiving the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

The doctor, whose name has not been released, was admitted to the intensive care unit of a public hospital in the northern state of Nuevo Leon after she experienced seizures, difficulty breathing and a skin rash.

“The initial diagnosis is encephalomyelitis,” the Health Ministry said in a statement released on Friday night. Encephalomyelitis is an inflammation of the brain and spinal cord.

Read more | >