The drugmaker Pfizer recently announced that vaccinated people are likely to need a booster shot to be effectively protected against new variants of covid-19 and that the company would apply for Food and Drug Administration emergency use authorization for the…
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Induced pluripotent stem cells hold great promise for regenerative medicine
The 2012 Nobel prize-winning discovery that ordinary cells could be coaxed to revert to their earliest pluripotent stage ushered in the era of ethical stem cell research. Suddenly, scientists can have an inexhaustible supply of pluripotent stem cells — the…
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Antibody drug cuts deaths for some severe COVID patients: study
A cocktail of synthetic antibodies reduces deaths among severe COVID patients who are unable to mount a strong immune response, results from a major clinical trial showed Wednesday. The therapy, developed by the US biotech firm Regeneron and given to…
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Antibody treatment reactivates the immune defense in patients with advanced-stage cancer
Researchers at the University of Turku, Finland, showed that the antibody treatment reactivates the immune defense in patients with advanced-stage cancer. The treatment alters the function of the body's phagocytes and facilitates extensive activation of the immune system. The immune…
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New collaborative effort to produce anti-HIV monoclonal antibodies
The Hotung Molecular Immunology group at St George’s, University of London has partnered with Leaf Expression Systems, a contract development and manufacturing organization, specializing in plant-based expression and production of proteins, to explore the feasibility of producing anti-HIV monoclonal antibodies…
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SARS-CoV-2 antibody response robust in nursing home residents after Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine
The first wave of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic was associated with significantly higher mortality among older people. As a result, this age group, particularly the vulnerable community living in long-term care facilities or nursing homes, was prioritized in…
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Novel mRNA delivery vehicle provides alternative to LNPs for SARS-CoV-2 vaccines
Researchers in the United States have developed an alternative messenger RNA (mRNA) delivery platform to the lipid nanoparticles that are currently used in vaccines against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) – the agent that causes coronavirus disease 2019…
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New machine learning method for designing more effective antibody drugs
Antibodies are not only produced by our immune cells to fight viruses and other pathogens in the body. For a few decades now, medicine has also been using antibodies produced by biotechnology as drugs. This is because antibodies are extremely…
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Broadly cross-reactive antibody to SARS-CoV-2 RBD with robust resistance to mutational escape
The current pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has triggered an intensive hunt for effective new and repurposed antivirals and antibodies, for prevention and treatment of the infection. A new preprint…
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Researchers explore an inhalable SARS-CoV-2 nanobody therapy
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the world’s third major coronavirus outbreak. To date, the SARS-CoV-2 has infected over 135 million lives and caused over 2.9 million deaths. Even…
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