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Displaying results 651 to 660 of 670.
Microbial Natural Products
Even today efficient drugs against many diseases are missing but finding new active substances is very complex. Support comes out of the ground. Myxobacteria are soil-living microorganisms that produce many active agents. Here you learn more about the search for new compounds with biological activity. This department is located at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS) .
Neuroinflammation and Neurodegeneration
What kind of role play infections and the associated inflammatory reactions for the progression or even for the onset of neurodegenerative diseases? Recurrent infections and the involved inflammation may trigger a series of processes in the brain that finally lead to neuronal damage due to the immune response. Thus, better understanding of neurodegenerative processes could improve the therapeutic approach in neurodegenerative disease.
Microbial Proteomics
A genome contains all the information that is needed to build an organism like, for instance, a bacterium. One of functional genomics’ central questions is: How are these blueprints implemented so that relatively simple molecular codes ultimately give rise to a microorganism with the potential of getting us sick? What are some of the underlying mechanisms and under what conditions do they become activated?
Microbial Interactions and Processes
Microorganisms in the environment are living in complex and interacting communities. Also the surfaces of the human body are inhabited by microorganisms, where the bacterial cell number significantly exceeds that of the human cells. These communities have co-evolved with the human host and are important for human health. They can, however, also be a reservoir for pathogenic microorganisms.
Cell Biology
Recent reports published by the World Health Organization (WHO) entitled "The Global Burden of Disease" (GBD) highlights the importance of research on host-pathogen interactions. Evolution is an ongoing process driving the development of highly virulent and multi-resistant bacteria strains or so called “emerging pathogens“. A deeper understanding of the complex interaction between pathogenic bacteria and their host is inevitable to face these problems in the future. As Cell biologists, we address host-pathogen interaction on the level of single cells, embodying the smallest living unit on both sides. Upon contact, pathogens need to manipulate the normal behavior of host cells in order to establish a niche for survival and to evade the hosts defense mechanisms. We study these induced changes on the cellular and molecular level, in order to exactly understand which host process is targeted by a given virulence mechanism an why.
Drug Design and Optimization
In order to combat the increasing number of resistant pathogens, the development of new anti-infective drugs is an important goal for pharmaceutical research. Efficient medications with novel modes-of-action to fight infectious diseases are urgently needed. Below, you may read more about the design, identification and optimisation of new drug candidates. This group is located at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS) .
Drug Bioinformatics
Bioinformatics is instrumental in all areas of molecular biology, from analysis of genome sequences towards predicting three-dimensional structure of drug-target complexes. We apply cutting-edge bioinformatics and computer science techniques for discovery of novel resistance mechanisms and predicting mode-of-action of bioactive compounds. This group is located at the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS)
Recombinant Protein Expression
Proteins play an important role in infectious diseases. They not only take over central functions in the invasion and replication of pathogens, but also in the defensive reaction of our body or as a drug. For a detailed investigation of proteins, scientists often require them in large amounts and extremely pure state. Read more about how proteins are artificially produced and purified.
Recoding Mechanisms in Infections
Many important viruses such as Ebola, Influenza, and HIV use RNA as genetic material. These viruses have an extremely small genome size compared to the eukaryotic host genomes, and therefore employ various alternative translation strategies such as stop codon read through, leaky scanning, non-IRES initiation and ribosome frameshifting to express their genes by the host translation machinery. Interestingly, the same strategies are also used in the host’s cellular gene expression. With our research we aim to understand how translational recoding changes the rules of standard decoding, allows simultaneous encoding of multiple proteins from the same mRNA and regulates gene expression in time and space. This group is located at the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI).
Core Facility of Comparative Medicine
To be able to investigate diseases, understand the relationships between pathogens and their host and to develop novel strategies against pathogens, the scientists at the HZI depend on experiments that involve the use of laboratory animals. For this purpose, the HZI operates a central animal facility on campus. The primary task of this service unit is the breeding and keeping of laboratory mice as well as provision of services for the scientists of the HZI, centered around laboratory animal science.
