virus, microbiology, disease & medicine

A year and a half into the pandemic, the long-term effects of SARS-CoV-2 infection are garnering more research attention as millions of long COVID patients emerge.

Researchers at Imperial College London and the University of Oxford are exposing healthy volunteers to SARS-CoV-2 for science.

Rollouts of the shot have ground to a halt following reports of blood clots, but health authorities say that these fears are unfounded and vaccination programs should continue.

Mix-and-match shots could simplify vaccine rollout and stimulate more-robust immune responses. Ongoing clinical trials will soon give answers.

Sam Wilson discusses a user-friendly set of resources that he and his collaborators developed to aid labs pivoting to study COVID-19.

The P.1 variant, which has also been detected in five US states, could be responsible for cases of reinfection, according to a preprint.

B.1.525 shares a mutation with the B.1.351 variant first detected in South Africa that seems to allow the virus to dodge the immune system.

Bacteria-infecting viruses affect the composition and behavior of microbes in the mammalian gut—and perhaps influence human biology.

Phages interact with bacteria and eukaryotic cells in ways that researchers suspect influence mammalian health.

It’s too early to know whether the L452R version of SARS-CoV-2 is highly infectious like the B.1.1.7 UK variant that is also spreading around the US.

See a news report on a study of expectant mothers with SARS-CoV-2 infections.

Compared with Zika and cytomegalovirus, the virus that causes COVID-19 appears to have a harder time penetrating the placenta and moving to a woman’s unborn baby.

The virus rarely spreads from mother to child before birth, but it can—and researchers are starting to investigate the path it takes.

Researchers detail how viral proteins interact with host RNA to disrupt the cell’s ability to fight back against infection.

We asked experts for measures people can take that may help boost defenses against COVID-19 and other respiratory diseases.

The COVID Symptom Study app aims to help patients and healthcare providers identify patterns in user-reported data.

A handful of factors tip the scales in making a virus more likely to trigger a disruptive global outbreak. Right now, scientists tend to rank influenza, coronaviruses, and Nipah virus as the biggest threats.

A coronavirus has been commanding the headlines for months, but strains of influenza and paramyxovirus are extremely dangerous pathogens that could spark outbreaks.

Pangolins are poached for their scales and meat, leading researchers to develop a set of molecular tools to help track and mitigate the trade.