microbiology, disease & medicine

White House officials hail convalescent plasma as a major breakthrough, but scientists say evidence supporting its effectiveness is still lacking.

The four factors that drive contagion

Following a string of outbreaks, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will move to an online-only semester.

UPenn’s Katharine Bar discusses ongoing clinical trials to explore the efficacy of treating patients with plasma from individuals who have recovered from an infection.

SalivaDirect, an open-source protocol, avoids many of the supply bottlenecks of other tools and could be offered for as little as $10 a test.

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.

In Chapter 13, “Trusting Experts—and the Trump Administration,” Marc Zimmer laments the communication breakdown between modern US policy makers and scientists

A new book explores the ways that research findings are used and misused.

China recently reported the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus on the outside of frozen food items imported from other countries, but experts stress the risk of transmission is extremely low.

A proof-of-concept study finds some commonly used facial coverings may perform worse than no mask at all.

The Johns Hopkins University researcher bucked the prevailing idea that the body would not launch an immune response against its own tissues, and in doing so established an entirely new scientific discipline.

Although modern society seems to be unwilling or unable to learn from the past, doing so just might hold the key to envisioning a brighter future.

Animals that can host pathogens dangerous to humans, such as rodents, birds, and bats, are proportionately more common in human-occupied spaces than in remote areas.

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

Working at bushmeat markets in Africa, researchers are trying to trace the trade networks of the mammals.

It’s not clear if their high viral load makes kids more likely to infect others.

Slow motion sneeze footage reveals the true reach of respiratory droplets ejected from the human body.

Face coverings prevent wearers from spreading pathogens, and might also limit the number of viral particles that enter the body, staving off severe infection, including COVID-19, research indicates.

None of the breastfed infants in the study tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 within the first two weeks of life.