Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI)

What are you looking for?

Newsroom

News from the Centre

News

Colistin is a last-resort antibiotic that is usually only used for severe infections with resistant bacteria. This is due to its severe kidney-damaging side effects, which occur in around 30 percent of treated patients. A research team at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) and the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF) has now been able to produce an inactivated, harmless form of colistin that is only activated in the body with the help of chemical switches. In this so-called click-to-release technique, the chemical switches are specifically bound to the disease-causing bacteria. The administered masked colistin is therefore activated specifically at the site of action. The researchers hope that this could reduce side effects. The study was published in the journal Angewandte Chemie.

21.10.2024

HZI Campus

News

According to the WHO, antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is one of the ten greatest threats to global health. In the EU alone, around 35,000 people die every year from antibiotic-resistant infections. The WHO estimates that 1.27 million deaths worldwide in 2019 were directly attributable to drug-resistant infections.

18.10.2024

HZI Campus

Schematic representation of metagenome data

News

Microorganisms do not just colonize the body of mammals during infections. Billions of microbes can be found on and in healthy humans and animals at any given time, communicating with each other via chemical signals and thus influencing their health. In two studies, researchers from the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS), Saarland University and Saarland University Hospital have now conducted a detailed study of the microbiome, i.e. the totality of all microorganisms, in humans and zoo animals. The aim was to identify starting points for strategies for the treatment and diagnosis of diseases. The researchers published their results in two articles in the journal Nature Communications. The HIPS is a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in collaboration with Saarland University.

17.10.2024

HIPS

View all news

Facts & Figures

0 +

Employees

0 Mio.

Basic funding in 2023 (plus third-party funding)

Publications in 2023

HZI in Focus

Research Groups

Virtual tour

Job portal

Multimedia & Podcast

Spin-Offs

Research stories

Research Program

One center - six locations

The HZI locations at a glance

The Sites of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research are distributed all over Germany. In addition to the main campus in Braunschweig, there are facilities in five other cities: Hamburg, Hanover, Saarbrücken, Würzburg and Greifswald.