What can ants and termites teach us about fighting disease?

You live in a crowded underground city with everyone you know. A relative comes home, and you can tell that they've been exposed to something that could get you all sick. Unchecked, a disease could wipe out your whole civilization. ...

Bats are hosts to a range of viruses but don't get sick – why?

Bats harbour many diverse viruses, including coronaviruses. Indeed, SARS, Mers and COVID-19—which are all caused by coronaviruses—are thought to have emerged from bats. These diseases can be deadly to humans, yet bats ...

Newly discovered protein gives signal for virus infection

Viruses have been part of animals and humans for eons. When viruses invade a cell, they can infiltrate the nucleus with their genome and become part of the genome of the infected organism. Viruses transfer their genes between ...

Parasites affect host responses to environmental change

Ignoring the role of parasites may lead to a misinterpretation of organism responses to environmental change, according to an Innovative Viewpoints article by ecologists from the University of Georgia. Their paper, "To improve ...

Symbionts as lifesavers

When people fall ill from bacterial infection, the first priority is to treat the disease. But where do these pathogens come from, and how do they thrive in the environment before the infection occurs? An international team ...

Nanoparticle exposure can awaken dormant viruses in the lungs

Nanoparticles from combustion engines can activate viruses that are dormant in in lung tissue cells. This is the result of a study by researchers of Helmholtz Zentrum München, a partner in the German Center for Lung Research ...

Model helps identify drugs to treat cat eye infections

It's a problem veterinarians see all the time, but there are few treatments. Feline herpes virus 1 (FHV-1) is a frequent cause of eye infections in cats, but the drugs available to treat these infections must be applied multiple ...

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