Futurismic

It’s that time of year again, when doctors recommend everyone from children to old folks get jabbed with the latest influenza vaccine that may or may not actually be effective against this year’s strain. And it’s that time of year again when people start worrying about the presumably inevitable next great ‘flu pandemic, which many fear could be coming as avian influenza continues to mutate.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could just get a single shot that would protect against multiple types…including the possible bird ‘flu pandemic?

Clinical trials of just such a vaccine have begun at Oxford University, led by Dr. Sarah Gilbert of the Jenner Institute. (Via PhysOrg.)

Existing flu vaccines work by inducing protective antibodies to proteins on the outer surface of the influenza virus. These proteins differ between strains and change over time, so each vaccine only works against a specific strain.

The Oxford scientists led by Dr Gilbert are taking a new approach. They have developed a novel vaccine that targets internal proteins essential to the flu virus that change very little over time or between strains.

‘By targeting the internal proteins of the virus, we can come up with a universal flu jab,’ explains Dr Gilbert. ‘The same vaccine would work against all seasonal flu and protect against bird flu.’

Such a universal vaccine would not change from year to year, removing the need for annual immunisations. All ages could receive the injection at any time of year, and manufacturers would be able to produce supplies continuously at a sufficient level.

***

The vaccine…induces T cells, part of the body’s immune system, to kill any cells infected by the flu virus, so controlling the infection. The body maintains a low-level T cell response to flu from previous flu infections which the vaccine should boost to levels high enough to protect against subsequent infection.

The vaccine is just entering a Phase 1 clinical trial, in which 12 healthy volunteers will receive a single injection, then have their immune response monitored over time. If the Phase 1 trial is successful, further clinical trials will follow.

Meanwhile…time to book that annual ‘flu shot. After all, it might work.

(Photo Credit: Cynthia Goldsmith, Centers for Disease Control, via Wikimedia Commons.)

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Outbreaks of bubonic plague in the U.S. might be linked to climate change in the Pacific Ocean.

Scientists from Norway, The US and Sweden found that the number of infections in the US seemed to shift along with changing climate conditions known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO).

The outbreaks seemed to occur during times of warm, wet conditions, authors wrote in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.

Global warming might mean fewer cases in a hotter, drier North America, but parts of the world expected to see warmer, moister tempertures might not be so lucky.

[Plague tower, Austria by celesteh]

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This is just a *face-palm* of epic proportions - welcome to the concept of “viral sovereignty“.

This extremely dangerous idea comes to us courtesy of Indonesia’s minister of health, Siti Fadilah Supari, who asserts that deadly viruses are the sovereign property of individual nations — even though they cross borders and could pose a pandemic threat to all the peoples of the world.

Before anyone jumps down my throat, yes, there is a precedent for developing nations protecting the intellectual property implicit in their native biome - the West has shafted them in the past, after all. But as Jamais Cascio points out:

… it’s extraordinarily important for information about potential pandemic diseases to be made as open as possible, if we want to avoid a global health disaster. Withholding viral data, and refusing to provide samples of the viruses, out of a misplaced fear of viropiracy (or more paranoid fantasies), is simply criminal.

I think you’d have to be very paranoid to not see the logic there, really. But anyway - if you catch a virus, it replicates in your body, right? So if viropiracy became a part of international legislation, would you technically be infringing the IP of a nation if you caught a unique disease there but crossed the border before the symptoms started to show, and end up liable to be prosecuted for piracy as well as smuggling? Probably not… but it highlights just how bloody stupid an idea it is, doesn’t it? [image by Noii]

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Dengue fever is one of the most common insect-borne viral infections known to medical science, and people in areas where it is prevalent are advised to take precautions to avoid mosquito bites by whatever means necessary, in parallel with programs aimed at reducing the number of mosquitoes. [image by MiikaS]

However, new research suggests that reducing the number of mosquitos may actually increase the likelihood of people contracting fatal cases of dengue, because more regular infections help to develop a strong immune response to the various serotypes of the infection:

“… if the number of mosquitoes is reduced, people are infected less frequently and so are less likely to catch another serotype during this crucial window. This led the team to the counter-intuitive idea that fewer mosquitoes could result in more cases of DHF.”

Humans have evolved complex responses to mosquito-borne illnesses, but it appears that they can be a double-edged sword. A genetic variation prevalent in people of African descent that confers some protection against malaria has been shown to make them more susceptible to HIV, the precursor to AIDS, at the same time as prolonging their survival of the immune system syndrome.

There’s a new hope on the horizon, though, as researchers at the University of Texas think they may have found the Achilles heel of the HIV virus:

“They have identified antibodies that, instead of passively binding to the target molecule, are able to fragment it and destroy its function. Their recent work indicates that naturally occurring catalytic antibodies, particularly those of the IgA subtype, may be useful in the treatment and prevention of HIV infection… “

And the even mosquitoes have their uses - a new form of “painless” hypodermic needle has been designed using the proboscis of the blood-sucking insects as its inspiration.

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A team of researchers has engineered a live form of salmonella that can deliver a vaccine. The modified bacterium eliminates all the things you don’t want in salmonella, the leading cause of food-borne illness. It’s also designed to destroy itself so that it’s not released into the environment. In the petri-dish experiment,� tame salmonella delivered a portion of S. pneumoniae bacterium to cells and stimulated an immune response.� Another possible benefit, if the technique works in animals and humans:

Unlike most vaccines that are entirely manufactured by a vaccine company, the attenuated recombinant salmonella vaccine after entry into the immunized individual serves as its own factory to produce (manufacture) the protective antigens (proteins) from the S. pneumoniae pathogen. This ability to cause manufacture in the immunized individual dramatically decreases the cost of such vaccines to make them affordable for use in the developing world, [Arizona State professor Roy] Curtiss said.

[Image: Salmonella invades human cells by Nutloaf]

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In old science fiction movies, mad scientists and the like always seem to have, somewhere around their lab, a brain in a jar.

I never much saw the point of that. How about something really useful: an immune system in a jar? (Via New Scientist Invention Blog.)

Invented by George Lewis, a virologist at the University of Maryland, this simple replica immune system would allow scientists to test vaccines in the laboratory to make sure they trigger the production of antibodies, without having to take the sometimes dangerous step of actually testing the vaccine in a living human being. This could greatly speed the process of producing new vaccines.

They simply culture white blood cells in the presence of an antigen (which could be a virus, or could be a vaccine designed to stimulate the immune system to produce antibodies against a specific virus). The cultured cells respond by producing new cells that make antibodies against the antigen.

Mad scientists, however, will probably want to stick with the old brain-in-the-jar: cultured white blood cells just don’t have the same visual impact.

(Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

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Biological warfare would appear to be a much older idea than we thought. New translations of ancient Middle Eastern texts suggest the Hittites had hit upon the idea of weakening their enemies with diseases by sending them rams “cursed” with a bacterial infection called tularemia - over 3 millennia ago. Tularemia is still a potentially lethal agent today … whether or not a sheep would be a successful delivery system in our modern age is an unknown quantity, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there were parts of the world where it could still be very effective. [Image by Dave-F]

On a lighter note, I can’t help but be reminded of the Sheep Cannon from the hilarious and addictive Worms computer games.

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Paging Dr. McCoy: a technique that uses a magnetic field to selectively separate tiny magnetic particles, developed at Purdue and Duke universities, could be used to diagnose the presence of many diseases in a single sample within minutes, with a sensitivity up to a million times higher than current methods. (Via Science Daily.)

View an animation of the process, called non-linear magnetophoretic separation, here. (The image above is a still from this animation.)

(Image: Purdue University via Science Daily.)

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From the Department of Science that Scares Me comes this little piece on salmonella sent to space that came back more dangerous than before.  The researchers describe it as a mutation that allowed the bacteria to survive in a certain kind of environment - microgravity - that fortuitously allowed them to be more effective (read: deadly) in organisms.

Thanks for giving me something more to worry about.  Sheesh!

(via DailyTech)

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“The Existential Cure,” a new short story by Will McIntosh, is now available in Futurismic Fiction.

The Existential Cure

by Will McIntosh

I stood on the edge of the curb, out of the flow of pedestrians, and watched for my son and my ex-wife. A blonde man with a twisted face and raging skin ulcers brushed against my shoulder as he lurched past. He was laughing like a loon. I tried not to flinch.

I spotted Caroline’s van and flagged it to the curb.

She stared at me through the window as Matt got out on the passenger side, her fat red lips set in an adolescent pout, cheeks streaked with too much blush, her big boobs spilling out of a low-cut blouse. I tried to recall a time when those boobs had made my head spin, but my revulsion was bone-deep and set like concrete.

Her window glided down. “He’s all yours,” she said.

“Mm-hm,” I said, not meeting her eyes.

Matthew waddled around the front of the van wheeling a suitcase, puffing from the exertion. Jesus, he’d gotten huge. How could Caroline let him get so big? Continue reading “THE EXISTENTIAL CURE by Will McIntosh”

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