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Scientific data suggests that many COVID-19 cases are not recorded due to mild and asymptomatic courses of infection. It is therefore not possible to reliably estimate the number of people who have actually been infected or are still infected with SARS-CoV-2. Furthermore, there is not yet sufficient data on how many people in Germany have already been infected and thus built up a presumed immunity to SARS-CoV-2. However, this data plays an important role in assessing and forecasting the further course of the pandemic. With this in mind, the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig is conducting a nationwide project in the district of Reutlingen. The project aims to improve the knowledge about the actual spread of infections with SARS-CoV-2 and the corresponding immunity in different population groups in Germany over time.

The Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig is establishing a new Helmholtz Institute in Greifswald, which shall bring together the individual competencies in the field of molecular infection research of the University of Greifswald, University Medicine Greifswald and the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut in one joint institute of the HZI. The financial means for setting up the Institute - 23 million euros for the new building and more than 35 million euros for the initialisation phase - have now been allocated by the Federal Government and the State of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. In Greifswald, Prof Katharina Riedel is coordinating this initiation phase as provisional founding director.

They are pathogens on contaminated food: Listeria bacteria can cause symptoms such as fever and diarrhoea, lead to premature births or miscarriages, or cause a deadly infection in people with a compromised immune system. Scientists at Technische Universität Braunschweig have found a new biomarker, a molecular feature, for the bacteria and generated new antibodies for the pathogens. The results could be used in diagnostics to further improve diagnostic procedures. The study involved the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI), the Leibniz Institute DSMZ-German Collection of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures and the Universities Federal do Agreste de Pernambuco and Federal de Pelotas, Brazil. The study was recently published in the journal Scientific Reports.

Mild or asymptomatic infections with the SARS coronavirus-2 are often not detected. Antibody studies can provide reliable information on what percentage of the population has already been infected with SARS-CoV-2. The Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig is coordinating a nationwide study to determine the spread of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2. Population samples will be examined in ten selected regions until summer 2021. From 14 October, around 3000 test persons from the city and district of Osnabrück will be invited to take part in the antibody test.

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.