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The Federal Agency for Disruptive Innovation (SPRIND) is pleased to announce the participants of the second phase of the SPRIND Challenge "A Quantum Shift for New Antiviral Agents". Six teams will each receive up to 1.5 million for the next twelve months to further develop new drug candidates against viral diseases. The team “PROTAC-powered antivirals” led by Prof Mark Brönstrup, head of the department “Chemical Biology” at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, receives funding for the development of a platform for broadly effective antiviral agents. In addition, the team “Mucboost” with participation of Dr Christian Sieben, head of the junior research group “Nano Infection Biology” at the HZI, will continue to receive funding. The “CRISPR Antivirals” team includes two HZI researchers, Prof Chase Beisel, head of the department “RNA Synthetic Biology” at the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), and Prof Claus-Michael Lehr, head of the department “Drug Delivery across Biological Barriers” at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS). HIRI and HIPS are HZI sites in cooperation with Julius Maximilians University (JMU) Würzburg and Saarland University, respectively.

Many people suffer from neurodermatitis (atopic dermatitis) or psoriasis. These chronic inflammatory diseases, which have so far been incurable, can lead to a significant loss of quality of life due to the agonising itching and stigmatisation in severe forms. Researchers of the exzellence cluster RESIST have now gained a number of new insights with potential clinical relevance using state-of-the-art technologies such as T-cell receptor and single-cell RNA sequencing based on skin biopsies and blood samples from patients. They have published these in the journal Allergy, currently the leading publication in the field of allergology, in two articles. The main authors include Dr Bowen Zhang from the research group of Prof Yang Li, Centre for Individualised Infection Medicine (CiiM) and TWINCORE - Centre for Experimental and Clinical Infection Research, and Dr Lennart Rösner and Dr Stephan Traidl from the team of Prof Thomas Werfel, Clinic for Dermatology, Allergology and Venereology at Hanover Medical School (MHH). The CiiM and TWINCORE are joint institutions of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig and MHH.

The transfer of research results into application is an important goal of the scientists at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig. The GO-Bio initial programme of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is now funding two HZI projects for a one-year concept phase in which the application idea will be elaborated and an implementation strategy developed. The BASIDIOMICS project, led by Dr Frank Surup and Prof Marc Stadler from the department “Microbial Drugs” at the HZI in Braunschweig, is developing a platform to make clinically and industrially relevant secondary substances from fungi accessible. Stadler is also a scientist in the research area “Novel Antibiotics” at the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF). A new class of active substances against the tropical disease malaria is to be developed in the ChloroMalaria project, led by Dr Walter Hofer and Dr Jennifer Herrmann from the department “Microbial Natural Products” at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS). The HIPS is a site of the HZI in cooperation with Saarland University. The projects start on 01 October 2022.

Healthy humans, healthy animals and a healthy environment - the One Health approach does not look at these individually, instead it considers them as a whole. A new alliance led by the University of Greifswald now wants to promote the entire Vorpommern region to a One Health-Region. The concept ‘T!Raum One Health-Region Vorpommern / Partizipatives Innovationsökosystem für gesunde Menschen, Tiere und Umwelt’ which translates to ‘One Health-Region Vorpommern / Participative Innovation Ecosystem for Healthy Humans, Animals and Environment’ shall receive grants of up to 18 million euros from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) to achieve this goal. Together with numerous partners from industry, associations, foundations, arts professionals, public administration, and politics, the university and University Medicine Greifswald, the Helmholtz Institute for One Health (HIOH), and the Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology Dummerstorf will develop this complex process in a One Health research cluster. The HIOH is a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, in cooperation with the University of Greifswald, the Greifswald University Medicine and the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut, Federal Research Institute for Animal Health (FLI).

The eHealth system SORMAS (abbreviation for “Surveillance Outbreak Response Management and Analysis System”) was developed in the Department of Epidemiology at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig under the direction of Prof Gérard Krause. It is used for the early detection of epidemics, but above all for structured process management to contain them. Due to increasing international demand, the HZI has established the non-profit SORMAS Foundation. The purpose of the foundation is to support health authorities and public health professionals worldwide in the implementation of SORMAS and other digital solutions for infection control.

A team of researchers led by Anca Dorhoi at the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut (FLI) and Emmanuel Saliba at the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), has elucidated age-dependent variations in cellular immunity in Rousettus aegyptiacus, known as the Egyptian fruit bat, a natural reservoir for filoviruses such as Marburg Virus. Using cutting-edge single-cell technologies, they mapped the bat blood with unprecedented resolution. The scientists unveiled that progression to adult age enriches for T lymphocytes and putative regulatory myeloid cells at expenses of B cells. These findings offer deeper insights into the immune system of an important wildlife reservoir species and are now published in Cell Reports.