Viruses News

May 9, 2025

Top Headlines

Researchers Map 7,000-Year-Old Genetic Mutation That Protects Against HIV

May 9, 2025 — Modern HIV medicine is based on a common genetic mutation. Now, researchers have traced where and when the mutation arose -- and how it protected our ancestors from ancient ...

Can Frisky Flies Save Human Lives?

May 9, 2025 — A scientist decided to find out why a bacterial infection makes fruit flies promiscuous. What he discovered could help curb mosquito-borne diseases and manage crop ...

Novel, Needle-Free, Live-Attenuated Influenza Vaccines With Broad Protection Against Human and Avian Virus Subtypes

May 9, 2025 — A research team has achieved a significant breakthrough in developing broadly protective, live-attenuated influenza vaccines (LAIV). These innovative LAIV platforms offer potential to develop ...

Building Vaccines for Future Versions of a Virus

May 8, 2025 — AI model EVE-Vax provides clues about how a virus may evolve and the immune response it could ...

Latest Headlines

updated 10:44pm EDT

Evaluating the Safety and Efficacy of a Smallpox Vaccine for Preventing Mpox

May 8, 2025 — The recent global monkeypox (mpox) outbreak, with a new and aggressive variant, has underscored the dire need for safe, broadly effective, and ...

HIV Drugs Offer 'Substantial' Alzheimer's Protection, New Research Indicates

May 8, 2025 — The drugs, called NRTIs, have the potential to prevent a million cases of Alzheimer's every year, the researchers ...

Engineering an Antibody Against Flu With Sticky Staying Power

May 8, 2025 — Scientists have engineered a monoclonal antibody that can protect mice from a lethal dose of influenza A, a new study shows. The new molecule combines the specificity of a mature flu fighter with the ...

Vaccines of the Future: Harnessing the Immune System for Long-Lasting Protection

May 7, 2025 — Scientists have uncovered a promising new way to enhance the effectiveness of vaccines by tapping into the potential of a specific type of immune ...

Viruses Under the Super Microscope: How Influenza Viruses Communicate With Cells

May 7, 2025 — Influenza viruses are among the most likely triggers of future pandemics. A research team has developed a method that can be used to study the ...

Shingles Vaccine Lowers the Risk of Heart Disease for Up to Eight Years

May 5, 2025 — People who are given a vaccine for shingles have a 23% lower risk of cardiovascular events, including stroke, heart failure, and coronary heart disease, according to a recent study of more than a ...

HIV: Genetic Characteristics Associated With Sustained HIV Remission After Stopping Treatment

Apr. 30, 2025 — Tackling HIV continues to be a major public health challenge, mainly because the persistence of viral reservoirs means that people living with HIV ...

New AI Technique Can Uncover Antiviral Compounds Using Limited Data

Apr. 30, 2025 — Artificial intelligence algorithms have now been combined with traditional laboratory methods to uncover promising drug leads against human enterovirus 71 (EV71), the pathogen behind most cases of ...

Process Driving Evolution and Major Diseases

May 2, 2025 — The only remaining autonomous 'jumping gene' can only attach to, and stitch a copy of itself into, DNA when it builds up into large clusters and only as cells ...

Gene Circuits Enable More Precise Control of Gene Therapy

Apr. 28, 2025 — To help achieve more precise control of gene therapy, engineers have designed a new control circuit that can keep gene expression levels within a target range. The method could be used to deliver ...

Bacteria's Mysterious Viruses Can Fan Flames of Antibiotic Damage

Apr. 28, 2025 — Scientists built a model that allows them to diminish phage communities from a mouse gut microbiome -- and then bring them back -- without affecting the bacteria. On a test run of their model, ...

Influenza Virus Hacks Cell's Internal System

Apr. 28, 2025 — The influenza virus manipulates the body's gene regulation system to accelerate its own spread. A new study also shows that an already approved drug could help strengthen immune defenses -- ...

Single-Dose Baloxavir Reduces Household Influenza Transmission

Apr. 25, 2025 — A landmark study reveals that a single oral dose of baloxavir marboxil (baloxavir) significantly reduces the transmission of influenza within households, marking a major advancement in influenza ...

Clinical Trials to Test Vaccine Against Alzheimer's-Promoting Tau Protein

Apr. 23, 2025 — Researchers hope to launch human clinical trials in their quest for a vaccine to prevent the buildup of pathological tau after demonstrating that this vaccine generated a robust immune response in ...

Scientists Identify Potential Treatments for Emerging Zoonotic Pathogens

Apr. 23, 2025 — A team of biomedical researchers trained a machine learning algorithm to identify more than two dozen viable treatments for diseases caused by zoonotic pathogens that can jump from animal hosts to ...

Bacteria Killing Material Creates Superbug Busting Paint

Apr. 23, 2025 — A bacteria killing coating created by scientists has been used in trials of a new paint that can be applied to a range of surfaces to effectively kill bacteria and viruses, including difficult to ...

Study Reveals Gaps in Flu Treatment for High-Risk Adults

Apr. 22, 2025 — A multi-state study reveals that many high-risk adults diagnosed with influenza (flu) in emergency departments and urgent care centers are not receiving timely antiviral treatment. Researchers found ...

Empowering Antibodies to Better Activate the Immune System

Apr. 22, 2025 — Antibodies are best known for their ability to latch onto and neutralize bacteria, viruses and other pathogens. But these immune proteins can do more than that: They also activate other components of ...

Americans Don't Think Bird Flu Is a Threat, Study Suggests

Apr. 18, 2025 — A team led by researchers say public ignorance and apathy towards bird flu (highly pathogenic avian influenza, or HPAI) could pose a serious obstacle to containing the virus and preventing a ...

Experimental Bird Flu Vaccine Excels in Animal Models

Apr. 17, 2025 — A vaccine under development has demonstrated complete protection in mice against a deadly variant of the virus that causes bird flu. The work focuses on the H5N1 variant known as 2.3.4.4b, which has ...

Structural Images of a Tuberculosis-Fighting Virus

Apr. 16, 2025 — Mycobacteria are the world's most deadly bacteria --c ausing infectious diseases including tuberculosis (TB), which alone kills more than one million people each year. New drugs to fight these ...

Experts Stress Importance of Vaccination Amidst Measles Outbreaks

Apr. 14, 2025 — Pediatric infectious diseases experts stress the importance of vaccination against measles, one of the most contagious viruses, which is once more spreading in the United ...

A Mysterious Pathogen: Oropouche Virus More Common in Latin America Than Previously Thought

Apr. 14, 2025 — Like the dengue and Zika viruses, Oropouche virus causes a febrile illness. There are recent indications that infections during pregnancy can cause damage to unborn babies. Researchers have now ...

Deadly Rodent-Borne Hantavirus Is an Emerging Disease With Pandemic Potential

Apr. 11, 2025 — Virginia Tech researchers seek to understand the environmental factors that influence the distribution of hantavirus in rodent populations across the United ...

Immune Protein Modification Blocks Viral Replication, Heart Inflammation

Apr. 10, 2025 — Virology researchers have found that a specific protein modification to the immune protein MDA5 is key to how our bodies detect and respond to viruses and viral replication. The publication explains ...

Certain Nasal Bacteria May Boost the Risk for COVID-19 Infection, Study Finds

Apr. 9, 2025 — A new study has found that certain bacteria living in the nose may influence how likely someone is to get a COVID-19 infection. The research reveals that certain types of nasal bacteria can affect ...

Multi-Virus Wastewater Surveillance Shows Promise at Smaller, Site-Specific Scales

Apr. 9, 2025 — In a new study, wastewater surveillance for multiple pathogens at five different sites identified local trends that were not captured in larger surveillance programs, and some sites used the data to ...

Engineering Smart Delivery for Gene Editors

Apr. 9, 2025 — A research team has developed an advanced delivery system that transports gene-editing tools based on the CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing system into living cells with significantly greater efficiency than ...

Nasal Spray H5N1 Avian Influenza Vaccine Developed

Apr. 8, 2025 — Scientists have pioneered an influenza virus vector-based nasal spray vaccine platform and developed a nasal spray H5N1 avian influenza vaccine. During the early COVID-19 pandemic, this platform ...

Viral 'Backbone' Underlies Variation in Rotavirus Vaccine Effectiveness

Apr. 8, 2025 — Researchers have shown that differences in the entire rotavirus genome -- not just its two surface proteins -- affect how well vaccines work, helping to explain why some strains are more likely to ...