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Researchers from the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI) in Würzburg and the University of Cambridge have revealed the molecular details of a genetic switch through their work on the 2A protein of cardioviruses. Using a new RNA-binding fold, the 2A protein activates a process called ribosomal frameshifting, which allows the virus to replicate more efficiently. This event represents an essential switch in the life cycle of the virus as well as presenting a viral Achilles' heel that could be targeted by future RNA-based therapies. The new findings have been published in the journal Nature Communications. The HIRI is a joint venture of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig and the Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg (JMU)

The rapid expansion of the Omicron variant has taken the international medical and scientific community by surprise. After infection or vaccination against the coronavirus, our bodies produce antibodies that play a key role in protecting us against COVID-19. While early reports indicate that numerous mutations on the virus surface of the Omicron variant may allow the virus to escape this immune recognition, it is unclear if the mutations improve binding to cell surface receptors and thus facilitate the infection.

Scientists at the Würzburg-based Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI) and the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig demonstrate for the first time how ZAP, a protein of the human immune defence system, inhibits the replication mechanism of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus and can reduce the viral load by 20-fold. The findings were published today in the journal Nature Communications. They may help develop antiviral agents in the fight against the pandemic.

Since 2017, interested citizen scientists can collect soil samples as part of the "Sample’ das Saarland" campaign and send them to the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS). The HIPS is a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in collaboration with Saarland University. Scientists at HIPS search for new types of myxobacteria in the samples, and grow and examine them in the laboratory. These globally distributed, predatory soil bacteria are capable of producing an enormous variety of chemical substances, so-called microbial natural products, which often represent excellent starting points for the development of drugs. At HIPS, the main focus is on molecules that are able to kill other bacteria. The idea behind this is that if myxobacteria can use these substances in the soil to hunt down other bacteria, scientists may be able to develop new drugs from the same substances to fight bacterial infections in humans. The focus is particularly on resistant pathogens for which the antibiotics available up to now can no longer be used with the usual success.

Between July 2020 and August 2021, the Epidemiology Department of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig examined the blood of approximately 26,000 individuals for antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus as part of the nationwide “MuSPAD” study. For samples collected between July and October 2020, it became evident that one to three per cent of the people had experienced a SARS-CoV-2 infection after the first wave. By the end of the third wave, the seroprevalence had increased but remained at less than 15 per cent at most study sites. Therefore, while there were two to five actual infections for every reported infection during the first wave, this ratio - and thus the number of undetected cases - decreased in the second and third waves. These results were recently published in the international issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt. In addition, a preprint publication of another study investigating the immune response after vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 based on samples from the MuSPAD study is under review.

A conversation about the direction of research at the HZI with Prof Thomas Pietschmann, who is the head of the "Experimental Virology" department at the HZI and director of the Experimental Virology Institute at the TWINCORE - Centre for Experimental and Clinical Infection Research