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The CRISPR-Cas gene scissors offer a wide range of potential applications, from the treatment of genetic diseases to antiviral therapies and diagnostics. However, to safely harness their powers, scientists are searching for mechanisms that can regulate or inhibit the systems’ activity. Enter the anti-CRISPR protein AcrVIB1, a promising inhibitor whose exact function has remained a mystery—until now. A research team from the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI) in Würzburg, in collaboration with the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, has uncovered the precise way AcrVIB1 works that expands the known means by which Acrs can shut down CRISPR. The results were published today in the journal Molecular Cell.

Construction of a modern new building for the Helmholtz Institute for One Health (HIOH) will begin this year on the University of Greifswald's Berthold-Beitz-Platz campus. Founded in 2021 as a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), the institute works closely with its local founding partners, the University of Greifswald, the University Medical Centre Greifswald and the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut. In line with the One Health approach, which considers human, animal and environmental health as an inseparable whole, the HIOH combines a variety of scientific disciplines. The common goal is to better understand the emergence of zoonotic diseases, antimicrobial resistance and the evolution of pathogens, and thus reduce the risk of new pandemics. In an increasingly interconnected world, in which pathogens that can be transmitted from animals to humans can travel across the globe in no time and develop resistance to drugs, the HIOH is making a decisive contribution to research into the origin and transmission of such infections – and is thus creating the basis for effective pandemic prevention measures.

The Republic of Côte d'Ivoire is a vibrant country in West Africa with rich cultural traditions and diverse ecosystems. Despite its beauty and vitality, the country faces significant challenges in its health system, particularly with regard to infectious diseases and antimicrobial resistance (AMR). These challenges are exacerbated by limited healthcare expenditure, which remains among the lowest in the world. Infectious diseases, the risk of zoonotic transmission (i.e., infectious diseases that can spread from animals to humans) and the high burden of healthcare-associated infections pose serious public health problems and make Côte d'Ivoire a priority country for international health cooperation.

The only natural host of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) is humans. Model organisms for laboratory studies, especially mice, cannot be infected which makes the search for a vaccine against HCV extremely difficult because the protective effect cannot be tested directly. In order to understand why the virus cannot infect mice and to enable the development of new animal models, researchers at TWINCORE in Hannover have generated an adapted virus variant that can infect mouse liver cells in vitro. They have now published their work in the Journal of Hepatology Reports. The TWINCORE is a joint institution of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig and Hannover Medical School (MHH).

Viruses are masters at disguise. When they are pushed too far by our immune system, they send new virus variants into play that are no longer recognized by immune cells. They escape our immune system by mutating the virus structures that are recognized by antibodies. In order to adapt vaccines to new circulating virus variants as promptly as possible, it is first necessary to find out which among the numerous mutations are actually responsible for the immune escape of a new virus variant. Researchers at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), in collaboration with the Hannover Medical School (MHH), have developed a method called reverse mutational scanning that can be used to detect such mutations quickly and reliably. The study has been published in the journal Nature Communications.

The European Research Council (ERC) has announced the results of the latest round of its “Proof of Concept Grant” 2024 competition. Among the researchers selected for funding is Prof. Yang Li, co-director of the Centre for Individualised Infection Medicine (CiiM) and head of the research department “Bioinformatics for Individualised Medicine”, who has thus been awarded one of the coveted ERC grants for the second time. In total, the ERC selected 134 projects for funding of 150,000 euros each. The CiiM is a branch of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), which is operated jointly with the Hannover Medical School (MHH).