Recombinant prion protein-specific Fab D18 antibodies inhibit prion propagation and clear cell cultures of infectious prions.

via caspase-1dependent mechanisms.

Conjugation of a self-antigen to papillomavirus-like particles elicit high titers of autoantibodies that can be used to treat arthritis and other diseases.

Tampering with the nucleotide excision DNA repair mechanism creates lethal breaks in the DNA and can kill cancerous cells.

Adiponectin, a natural substance secreted by fat cells, appears to reverse the effects of insulin resistance and to lower blood glucose levels.

Same-race faces elicit more activity in brain regions linked to face recognition.

A common processing machinery generates small RNAs that mediate both RNA interference and endogenous gene regulation.

The respiratory syncytial virus has a G glycoprotein similar to the leukocyte chemoattractant Fkn that can facilitate infection and modify the host immune response.

The structure of the enzyme DDAH that controls levels of arginine derivates offers the basis for designing selective indirect inhibitors of NO.

cells of the elderly can be enough to induce metabolic dysfunction and type 2 diabetes.

Transfer of therapeutic genes into haematopoietic stem cells can potentially cure blood disorders such as X-linked severe combined immunodeficiency. But human stem cells are relatively intractable to the available viral vectors. In August Blood, George Vassilopoulos and colleagues from University of Washington, Seattle, describe a new vector system based on foamy viruses from the spumavirus family that can be used for gene transfer into murine haematopoietic stem cells.Foamy viruses are nonpatho

Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) infection induces a strong immune response, but by an as yet unknown mechanism, can persist within macrophages. In July Journal of Immunology Erika Noss and colleagues from Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio show that a 19-kDa lipoprotein produced by MTB, inhibits antigen processing by macrophages and prevents recognition by T cells, thereby promoting chronic TB infection.Using electroelution techniques, Noss et al. extracted a specific component fr