COVID-19 vaccination may protect against variants better than natural infection

A Stanford study found that COVID-19 vaccines generate antibodies that are more capable of recognizing viral variants than are those created by natural infection.
Credit: Steve Fisch

Antibodies generated by COVID-19 vaccines are more suited to recognizing viral variants than antibodies that arise from natural infection, according to a study by researchers at Stanford Medicine.

A key finding of the study might explain why: Regions in lymph nodes known as germinal centers — where antibodies are chosen and amplified by the immune system — are highly active for several weeks after vaccination. In contrast, the structure and cell composition of germinal centers are profoundly disrupted in people with fatal cases of COVID-19.

“Vaccination generates a range of antibodies capable of responding to viral antigens beyond the original exposure,” said Scott Boyd, MD, PhD, associate professor of pathology. “This greater breadth of antibodies suggests that vaccination is likely to be more protective against viral variants than immunity generated by previous infection.”

Boyd shares a senior authorship of the study, which was published in Cell, with Kari Nadeau, MD, PhD, the Naddisy Foundation Professor in Pediatric Food Allergy, Immunology, and Asthma. The lead authors are postdoctoral scholar Katharina Röltgen, PhD; former postdoctoral scholar Sandra Nielsen, PhD; clinical assistant professor of pathology Oscar Silva, MD, PhD; and life science researcher Sheren Younes, MD, PhD.

Eating prunes may help protect against bone loss in older women

It’s already well known that prunes are good for your gut, but new Penn State research suggests they may be good for bone health, too.

In a research review, the researchers found that prunes can help prevent or delay bone loss in postmenopausal women, possibly due to their ability to reduce inflammation and oxidative stress, both of which contribute to bone loss.

“In postmenopausal women, lower levels of estrogen can trigger a rise of oxidative stress and inflammation, increasing the risk of weakening bones that may lead to fractures,” said Connie Rogers, associate professor of nutritional sciences and physiology. “Incorporating prunes into the diet may help protect bones by slowing or reversing this process.”

The review was recently published in the journal Advances in Nutrition.

Osteoporosis is a condition in which bones become weak or brittle that can happen to anyone at any age, but according to the researchers is most common among women over the age of 50. The condition affects more than 200 million women worldwide, causing almost nine million fractures each year.

While medications exist to treat osteoporosis, the researchers said there is a growing interest in ways to treat the condition with nutrition.

“Fruits and vegetables that are rich in bioactive compounds such as phenolic acid, flavonoids and carotenoids can potentially help protect against osteoporosis,” said Mary Jane De Souza, professor of kinesiology and physiology, “with prunes in particular gaining attention in previous research.”

Scientists breaking barriers to treating heart failure

New technology that could radically improve the outlook for patients with serious heart conditions has been developed by scientists at the Auckland Bioengineering Institute (ABI) and the Universities of Bristol and Bath together with Ceryx Medical Limited.

Julian Paton, currently Professor of Translational Physiology at ABI, began studying the relationship between the heartbeat and respiration more than a decade ago while at Bristol's School of Physiology, Pharmacology & Neuroscience. He has since worked with his team at UK-based Ceryx Medical, the company he founded while at Bristol, to develop ‘Cysoni’, a unique cardiac rhythm management device.

The bionic device paces the heart with real-time respiratory modulation. The innovation stems from the idea that heart rate increases and decreases with each breath in normal physiology, termed ‘respiratory sinus arrhythmia’ (RSA). Cysoni replicates this natural interaction, triggering heartbeats based on respiratory function, as opposed to the usual ‘metronomic’ generation by traditional pacemakers. This sets Cysoni apart from existing devices, which generate an output with no breath-by-breath induced variation in the inter-beat interval. In essence, Cysoni listens and responds to the cardiorespiratory system and optimizes its performance.

The team’s studies found that RSA pacing increased cardiac output by 20 per cent, compared to monotonic pacing. This increase in output led to a significant decrease in heart failure-associated symptoms such as apneas and significant improvements in performance during exercise. It also reversed cardiomyocyte hypertrophy and restored the T-tubule structure that is essential for force generation. This repair of cardiac damage indicative of heart failure is particularly exciting.

Two-dimensional material could store quantum information at room temperature

Artistic rendition of isolated spins on hexagonal boron nitride under an optical microscope 
Credit: Qiushi Gu

Quantum memory is a major building block to be addressed in the building of a quantum internet, where quantum information is securely stored and sent via photons, or particles of light.

Researchers from the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, in collaboration with colleagues from UT Sydney in Australia, have identified a two-dimensional material, hexagonal boron nitride, that can emit single photons from atomic-scale defects in its structure at room temperature.

The researchers discovered that the light emitted from these isolated defects gives information about a quantum property that can be used to store quantum information, called spin, meaning the material could be useful for quantum applications. Importantly, the quantum spin can be accessed via light and at room temperature.

The finding could eventually support scalable quantum networks built from two-dimensional materials that can operate at room temperature. The results are reported in the journal Nature Communications.

Future communication networks will use single photons to send messages around the world, which will lead to more secure global communication technologies.

Futuristic coating for hospital fabrics and activewear kills COVID and E. coli

Material coated in polymer in small scale tests with a green lamp.
Credit: Taylor Wright

UBC researchers have developed an inexpensive, non-toxic coating for almost any fabric that decreases the infectivity of the virus that causes COVID-19 by up to 90 per cent.

And in the future, you might be able to spray it on fabric yourself.

“When you’re walking into a hospital, you want to know that pillow you’re putting your head onto is clean,” says lead author Taylor Wright, a doctoral student in the department of chemistry. “This coating could take a little bit of the worry off frontline workers to have Personal Protection Equipment with antimicrobial properties.”

Researchers soaked fabric in a solution of a bacteria-killing polymer which contains a molecule that releases sterilizing forms of oxygen when light shines on it. They then used an ultraviolet (UV) light to turn this solution to a solid, fixing the coating to the fabric. “This coating has both passive and active antimicrobial properties, killing microbes immediately upon contact, which is then amped up when sunlight hits the cloth,” says senior author Dr. Michael Wolf, a professor of chemistry.

Both components are safe for human use, and the entire process takes about one hour at room temperature, says Wright. It also makes the fabric hydrophobic, meaning microbes are less likely to stick to the cloth, and doesn’t seem to affect the strength of the fabric.

A Possible COVID-19 Silver Lining for Great Ape Conservation

Mountain gorilla family
Credit: Skyler Bishop for Gorilla Doctors

Respiratory illness outbreaks among wild mountain gorillas in Volcanoes National Park have declined since the start of COVID-19, according to a “Correspondence” report in the journal Nature from Gorilla Doctors and the Rwanda Development Board.

Mountain gorillas are susceptible to human-transmitted respiratory pathogens. Respiratory illness is the second leading cause of death in wild, human-habituated populations.

In the five years prior to March 2020, the Volcanoes National Park population averaged 5.4 respiratory illness outbreaks in gorilla family groups annually. In contrast, from March 2020 through December 2021, the population averaged 1.6 respiratory illness outbreaks in the family groups each year. To date, SARS-CoV-2 has not been detected in samples collected from mountain gorillas with respiratory illness.

The decline in respiratory illness outbreaks in mountain gorillas during the COVID-19 pandemic correlates with an overall reduction in the number of people coming into close proximity of the gorillas, and with additional health protection measures taken to reduce the risk of disease transmission from humans to gorillas.

First Modern Humans Arrived in Europe Earlier Than Previously Known

Close-up of the Grotte Mandrin in southern France where scientists have uncovered layers of history that include both modern human and Neanderthal activity.
Credit: Ludovic Slimak

Some 30 years of archeological and other types of scientific research around the ancient artifacts and human remains in the Grotte Mandrin, located in the Rhone River Valley in southern France, has revealed that humans may have arrived in Europe about 10,000 years earlier than originally thought. This conclusion, drawn by an international team of researchers including Jason Lewis, PhD, of Stony Brook University, will help scientists rethink the arrival of humans into Europe and their replacement of and interactions with Neanderthals who also lived in the cave. The research is detailed in a paper published in Science Advances.

Previous studies have suggested that the first modern humans reached the European continent – originally from Africa and via the Levant, the eastern Mediterranean crossroads – between 43,000 and 48,000 years ago. But this discovery of modern human presence in the heart of the Rhone River Valley at Grotte Mandrin points to about 54,000 years ago.

The area of the cave excavated and analyzed that proved the evidence of modern human presence is Mandrin’s Layer E. It is sandwiched between 10 other layers of artifacts and fossils that contain evidence of Neanderthal life.

Vaccinated Patients Less Likely to Need Critical Care During Omicron Surge

A new study of COVID-19 patients who had the omicron variant of the disease shows that vaccinated adults had less severe illness than unvaccinated adults and were less likely to land in intensive care. Source: Cedars-Sinai

The highly contagious omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 became the dominant strain in the United States in mid-December 2021, coinciding with a rise in hospitalizations of patients with COVID-19. Among those admitted during the omicron surge, vaccinated adults had less severe illness compared with unvaccinated adults and were less likely to land in intensive care, according to a new study by Cedars-Sinai and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

"Overall, the omicron-period group had a lower likelihood of being admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) and were also less likely to require invasive mechanical ventilation compared with the delta-period group,” said Matthew Modes, MD, a pulmonologist at Cedars-Sinai and co-first author of the paper.

Investigators also found that during the omicron period fewer patients died while hospitalized (4.0%), compared with those admitted when the delta variant was dominant (8.3%).

This Bizarre Looking Helmet Can Create Better Brain Scans

Ke Wu, a PhD student in BU’s department of mechanical engineering, demonstrates a new magnetic metamaterial device intended to be used in conjunction with MRI machines to boost the quality of brain scans.
Credit: Cydney Scott

It may look like a bizarre bike helmet, or a piece of equipment found in Doc Brown’s lab in Back to the Future, yet this gadget made of plastic and copper wire is a technological breakthrough with the potential to revolutionize medical imaging. Despite its playful look, the device is actually a metamaterial, packing in a ton of physics, engineering, and mathematical know-how.

It was developed by Xin Zhang, a College of Engineering professor of mechanical engineering, and her team of scientists at BU’s Photonics Center. They’re experts in metamaterials, a type of engineered structure created from small unit cells that might be unspectacular alone, but when grouped together in a precise way, get new superpowers not found in nature. Metamaterials, for instance, can bend, absorb, or manipulate waves—such as electromagnetic waves, sound waves, or radio waves. Each unit cell, also called a resonator, is typically arranged in a repeating pattern in rows and columns; they can be designed in different sizes and shapes, and placed at different orientations, depending on which waves they’re designed to influence.

Animals deceive opponents by producing giant weapons on a small budget

En Garde! Belligerent fiddler crabs intimidate before striking, relying on relatively cheap prop weapons to scare.
Lillie via Wikimedia Commons

Two knights stand face to face. One has a plain average-sized sword. The other has a massive fear-inducing sword stained with blood. After one quick look at it, the first knight quickly puts his average sword away, backs off to a safe distance, and runs for his life.

He’ll never know that the massive fear-inducing sword was actually a plastic toy.

In a new study appearing in the journal Biology Letters, Jason Dinh, Ph.D. candidate in Biology at Duke University, shows that animal weapons can be a lot like plastic swords: impressive, but ultimately cheap.

From deer antlers to lobster claws, many animals have weapons. These are often large, clunky and heavy appendages that are metabolically costly for the animal to maintain. In clawed crustaceans, such as shrimps, lobsters, and crabs, their weapons can weigh more than a third of the animal’s body mass. That’s a lot of extra tissue to feed and maintain, even when the animal is perfectly still.

“Some animals can spend 40% of their energy budget for the day just maintaining themselves sitting there doing nothing,” Dinh said. “It's a very slow and steady cost that's happening throughout the animal’s adult life.”