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An important question in modern life science and medical research is how the microorganisms living in and on a body influence the life processes and thus health and disease of the host organism. Scientists at Kiel University and the Helmholtz Institute for One Health (HIOH), a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), assume that there are connections between the entirety of the body's microbial colonization, the so-called microbiome, and the development of diseases. Chronic inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in particular is apparently closely linked to the composition and disturbance of the microbiome. At the same time, it is difficult to define a healthy normal state of the human microbial colonization, as it is influenced by many factors and the individual composition varies from person to person.

On 23 January 2024, State Secretary Judith Pirscher from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) visited the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig. She gained an insight into the current research program and the recently launched large-scale project "Microbial Stargazing - Research into Resilience Mechanisms of Microbes and Humans" (MICROSTAR for short), which is headed by the new Scientific Director of the HZI, Prof Josef Penninger.

BioVersys AG, a multi-asset, clinical stage biopharmaceutical company focusing on research and development of novel antibacterial products for serious life-threatening infections caused by multi-drug resistant (“MDR”) bacteria, announced today that it has established a long-term research collaboration with the prestigious European institute, Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) and its site Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS).

To combat viruses, bacteria and other pathogens, synthetic biology offers new technological approaches whose performance is being validated in experiments. Researchers from the Würzburg Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research and the Helmholtz AI Cooperative applied data integration and artificial intelligence (AI) to develop a machine learning approach that can predict the efficacy of CRISPR technologies more accurately than before. The findings were published today in the journal Genome Biology.

Modern pharmaceutical research generates large amounts of data faster than ever before. To analyze and evaluate this data, it is collected and structured in extensive databases and thus provides the basis for the development of new active ingredients. Researchers at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS) have now published two such databases. While the "ABC-HuMi" database focuses on genetic data from microorganisms that colonize humans, "ZEBRA" provides a high-resolution cell atlas of the human and mouse brain. Both databases were published in the annual database issue of the journal Nucleic Acids Research.

Despite the end of the pandemic, COVID-19 continues to pose a serious health threat. Most individuals have established robust immune protection and do not develop severe disease but the infection can still lead to marked and sometimes long-lasting disease symptoms. In the late summer of 2023 a new SARS-CoV-2 variant emerged, BA.2.86 (Pirola), which, based on genetics, differs markedly from all previously circulating variants.