Recent News

By Region: North America

Staying Safe in a Biology Revolution

(CFR) CFR Senior Fellow for Global Health Laurie Garrett explains the conundrum of dual-use research of concern (DURC), in which the same experiments that allow scientists to understand pandemics can also create dangerous pathogens. Combined with advances in synthetic biology and increasingly affordable technologies, there is the possibility for a true biology revolution.

July 18, 2013
| Filed under North America and Policy & Initiatives
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Compound Discovered at Sea Shows Potency Against Anthrax, MRSA

(InfectionControlToday) A team led by William Fenical at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego has discovered a new chemical compound from an ocean microbe in a preliminary research finding that could one day set the stage for new treatments for anthrax and other infections such as those caused by methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). Read More »

July 18, 2013
| Filed under Europe, North America, Countermeasures, and Research
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Study examines characteristics, features of West Nile virus outbreaks

(EurekAlert) An analysis of West Nile virus epidemics in Dallas County in 2012 and previous years finds that the epidemics begin early, after unusually warm winters; are often in similar geographical locations; and are predicted by the mosquito vector index (an estimate of the average number of West Nile virus-infected mosquitoes collected per trap-night), information Read More »

July 18, 2013
| Filed under North America, South America, Public Health, and Research
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Research leads to affordable technology to fight mosquito-borne diseases

(EurekAlert) Technology that hampers mosquitoes’ host-seeking behavior, identified at the University of California, Riverside in 2011, has led to the development of the world’s first product that blocks mosquitoes’ ability to efficiently detect carbon dioxide, their primary method of tracking human blood meals. The initial research was performed in the laboratory of Anandasankar Ray, an Read More »

July 17, 2013
| Filed under Africa, North America, South America, South Asia, Countermeasures, and Research
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Findings offer alternative approach to creating a universal influenza vaccine

(ScienceDaily) A team of scientists, led by researchers at The Wistar Institute, has determined that it might be possible to stimulate the immune system against multiple strains of influenza virus by sequentially vaccinating individuals with distinct influenza strains isolated over the last century. Their results also suggest that world health experts might need to re-evaluate Read More »