In the Press

What is the typical movement behavior of visitors to large events, such as concerts, and what does this mean for the risk of spreading infectious diseases like COVID-19? A group of researchers from the Informatics Institute at the University of Amsterdam, together with an epidemiologist from the Utrecht University, set out to investigate using data from events in a large stadium in Amsterdam. Their results have now been published in the journal Scientific Reports.

Bloodstream levels of a protein fragment called endotrophin can be used to predict outcomes in patients with a common form of heart failure, according to a study co-led by researchers at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.

A common 'forever chemical' known as PFOS (perfluorooctanesulfonic acid) has been linked to liver cancer in humans in a worrying new study. Once a key ingredient in the water-repelling product commercially known as Scotchguard, PFOS was finally phased out soon after the turn of the century following concerns over its toxicity and environmental impact.

A single research test has the potential to predict which patients treated with immunotherapies—which harness the immune system to attack cancer cells—are likely to have their cancer recur or have severe side effects, a new study found.

New research published in Science Advances today conducted by researchers at Peter MacCallum Cancer Center show a new treatment for two challenging blood cancers could potentially help more patients than originally thought.

An estimated 15% of girls aged 9–14 years worldwide have been vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) with the recommended two-dose or three-dose schedules. A one-dose HPV vaccine schedule would be simpler and cheaper to deliver. We report immunogenicity and safety results of different doses of two different HPV vaccines in Tanzanian girls.

A large team of researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch, working with two colleagues from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine and two with the Mayo Clinic, has developed a vaccine for COVID-19 that targets both the spike and nucleocapsid proteins in the SARS-CoV-2 virus. In their paper published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, the group explains their approach to developing the new vaccine and describes how well it worked in test mice and hamsters.

A pair of new studies describe long-COVID findings, one from Spain showing that nearly 40% of bilateral pneumonia patients had impaired lung diffusion 1 year after hospitalization, and the other from England demonstrating that double-vaccinated adults were 41% less likely than their unvaccinated peers to report symptoms 3 months or more after infection.

Avian influenza is caused by influenza Type A virus (influenza A). Avian-origin influenza viruses are broadly categorized based on a combination of two groups of proteins on the surface of the influenza A virus: hemagglutinin or “H” proteins, of which there are 16 (H1-H16), and neuraminidase or “N” proteins, of which there are 9 (N1-N9).

Two US monkeypox patients developed encephalomyelitis—inflammation of the brain and spinal cord—in the week after symptom onset, one in Colorado and one in Washington, DC, suggesting neurologic complications are a potential outcome of monkeypox infections. The cases are described today in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.