PLoS Pathogens

Temperature, newts and a skin-eating fungus

Salamanders are more sensitive to a skin-eating fungus at colder temperatures, pointing to locations of North America where pathogen invasion is most likely.

HIV cell

Key factors in HIV-1 replication

HIV-1, the virus that causes AIDS, exploits inositol phosphates in T cells to aid its own assembly and maturation — suggesting that targeting inositol phosphate binding could inhibit HIV-1 replication.

Study’s findings may help eventually close the door on COVID-19

Researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) at Galveston have discovered what may be the Achilles’ heel of the coronavirus, a finding that may help close the door on COVID-19 and possibly head off future pandemics.

Antibodies eye Pacific Island “fever”

Vanderbilt Vaccine Center team isolates monoclonal antibodies against Ross River virus, which causes rash, fever and debilitating muscle and joint pain lasting three to six months.

Antibody isolated at VUMC found to halt dengue virus

Using part of an antibody isolated at Vanderbilt that “broadly neutralizes” the human dengue virus, biologists at the University of California San Diego and colleagues have disarmed the mosquito that transmits the disabling and potentially deadly tropical infection.

Hope for an RSV vaccine

Newly discovered features in an RSV protein may be useful for rational structure-based vaccine design.