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In a joint study of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), and the Heinrich-Pette-Institute, Leibniz Institute for Experimental Virology (HPI), the origins of the first SARS-CoV-2 outbreak in May 2020 at Tönnies in Rheda-Wiedenbrück, Germany's largest meat processing complex, were investigated. The study was published on the preprint platform SSRN in July 2020. The results have now been peer-reviewed and were published in the journal EMBO Molecular Medicine.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Emmanuelle Charpentier, former Head of the Department “Regulation in Infection Biology” at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), Braunschweig, and Professor at the Hannover Medical School, Hannover, for her groundbreaking work on the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology. She shares the prize with Jennifer A. Doudna.

Even though we have been living with the COVID- pandemic for more than half a year, there are still many unanswered questions and major uncertainties regarding further infection. How will the epidemic develop in Germany – especially during the upcoming flu season and the cold autumn and winter months? Which strategies are particularly effective in containing the rising number of infections in Germany and worldwide? What has proved successful in recent months? What properties of SARS-CoV- are now understood? And what measures can be imposed for the population and the economy without restricting social life too much?

Many SARS-coronavirus-2 infections are mild or completely asymptomatic and are therefore not detected. This makes it difficult to assess pandemic trends, prevention strategies and mortality rates. Antibody studies can provide reliable information on what percentage of the population has already been infected with SARS-CoV-2. In a nationwide study, the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig is using regional samples to investigate the spread of antibodies against the novel coronavirus. The study examines about 3000 test persons in the urban region of Aachen from 9th September 2020.

The European Research Council (ERC) awards three scientists from the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) with an ERC Starting Grant. The grants of up to 1.5 million Euros over a period of five years will be awarded to Jun Prof Neva Caliskan from the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), Jun Prof Gregor Fuhrmann from the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS) and Prof Yang Li from the Centre for Individualised Infection Medicine (CiiM).

Bacteria show a wide range of capabilities in withstanding antibiotic treatment or attack by our immune system, which are great challenges in infection research. Scientists at the Würzburg-based Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), have developed a novel approach to reading the activity of hundreds of genes in an individual bacterium by sequencing its RNA. This groundbreaking work was just published in the journal Nature Microbiology. Using bacterial single-cell RNA sequencing it might be possible to elucidate the tricks bacteria use to develop resistance and close these loopholes with tailored drugs.