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Leukemia is the most common cancer in children. Cancer treatment severely weakens the children's immune system and they can easily develop opportunistic infections. One of the most common causes of such complications is the cytomegalovirus (CMV) from the herpes virus family. The department “Viral Immunology” headed by Prof. Luka Cicin-Sain at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig is now investigating immunotherapy options against CMV. The project is enabled by a donation from the Günter Hansmeier Krebsstiftung in Braunschweig, which is funding the position of a doctoral researcher for three years.

Due to the progressive spread of antimicrobial resistance, clinically important antibiotics are increasingly losing their effectiveness. New active substances are urgently needed to counteract this development. In order to circumvent existing resistance, new drugs must address previously unused target structures within the pathogens. HIPS scientist Prof. Anna Hirsch has been able to identify one such target and successfully acquired a “Proof of Concept” grant of the European Research Council (ERC) to support the development of novel active substances.

The Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever virus (CCHFV), first described in 1944, is also spreading rapidly in Europe due to global warming and is included in the WHO list of infectious agents with epidemic or pandemic potential as a top priority. There are currently no therapeutic or preventative measures available against the disease, which is mainly transmitted by ticks and is fatal in 40 per cent of cases.

The decay of ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a crucial mechanism for controlling gene expression in response to environmental stresses. Researchers from the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI) and the Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU) have developed a statistical approach that allows a more accurate prediction of RNA half-lives in bacteria.

Every two years, the Rudolf Schülke Foundation awards the Hygiene Prize to researchers who have achieved special solutions to problems in the fields of hygiene, infection prevention or public health. This year, the award was split: One half went to PD Dr Tilman E. Klassert and Dr Cristina Zubiria-Barrera from the "Dynamics of Respiratory Infections" research group at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI). The group is headed by Prof. Hortense Slevogt, who is also a senior physician for clinical infectiology at the Clinic for Pneumology and Infectiology at Hannover Medical School (MHH).

The intricacies of how intestinal bacteria adapt to their environment have yet to be fully explored. Researchers from the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI) in Würzburg and the University of California, Berkeley, USA, have now successfully closed a gap in this knowledge: They have identified a small ribonucleic acid (sRNA) that affects the susceptibility of the gut pathogen Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron to specific antibiotics.