An asthma vaccine effective in mice
2021-05-17
(Press-News.org) Inserm teams led by Laurent Reber (Infinity, Toulouse) and Pierre Bruhns (Humoral Immunity, Institut Pasteur, Paris) and French company NEOVACS have developed a vaccine that could induce long-term protection against allergic asthma, reducing the severity of its symptoms and thus significantly improving patient quality of life. Their research in animals has been published in the journal Nature Communications.
Asthma is a chronic disease affecting around 4 million people in France and 340 million worldwide. Allergic asthma is characterized by inflammation of the bronchial tubes and respiratory discomfort caused by the inhalation of allergens, most often dust mites. This exposure to dust mites and other allergens leads to the production of antibodies called immunoglobulin E (IgE) and type 2 cytokines (such as interleukin-4 (IL-4) and IL-13) in the airways. This leads to a cascade of reactions resulting in hyperresponsiveness of the respiratory tract, overproduction of mucus, and eosinophilia (when there are too many eosinophils, a type of white blood cell, in the airways).
Inhaled corticosteroids are the gold standard for controlling asthma. However, in the case of severe asthma, this treatment is not enough. The use of therapeutic monoclonal antibodies that target IgE or the IL-4 and IL-13 pathways is then required. However, these are costly and require the long-term or even lifelong administration of injections.
To overcome this problem, researchers from Inserm, Institut Pasteur, and the company NEOVACS, have developed a conjugate vaccine, called a kinoid, by coupling the recombinant cytokines IL-4 and IL-13 with a carrier protein called CRM197 (a non-pathogenic mutated form of the diphtheria toxin, used in many conjugate vaccines).
The preclinical results (in animal models) show that this vaccine induces the sustained production of antibodies specifically directed against IL-4 and IL-13. Indeed, six weeks after the first injection of the conjugate vaccine, 90% of the mice presented high levels of antibodies. Over one year after primary immunization, 60% of them still had antibodies capable of neutralizing IL-4 and IL-13 activity.
The researchers also showed an effect on asthma symptoms: the vaccine was able to strongly decrease levels of IgE, eosinophilia, mucus production and airway hyperresponsiveness in a model of dust mite allergic asthma. This study therefore suggests both the prophylactic and therapeutic efficacy of the vaccine in this model of asthma and no adverse effects were observed in the animals.
The research team's findings will now need to be tested in a clinical trial setting.
INFORMATION:
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2021-05-17
A randomized double-blind controlled trial of convalescent plasma for adults hospitalized with severe COVID-19 found that mortality at 28 days in the treatment arm was half the rate seen in the control arm (12.6% vs. 24.6%), although treatment was not associated with other improvements in clinical status.
The study was led by investigators from the Center for Infection and Immunity at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health; Columbia University Irving Medical Center; ICAP at Columbia University; Instituto Nacional de Infectologia and Hospital Federal dos Servidores do Estado in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; University of Washington; and New York Blood Center. The results are published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
According ...
2021-05-17
Patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction who took the antifibrotic drug pirfenidone saw a significant reduction in a marker of heart muscle scarring compared with patients who received a placebo, based on findings from an early-phase trial presented at the American College of Cardiology's 70th Annual Scientific Session.
"Observational data suggests that heart muscle scarring, or fibrosis, is an important disease process for heart failure prognosis," said Chris Miller, MD, a cardiologist and National Institute for Health Research Clinician Scientist at the University ...
2021-05-17
Patients with heart failure with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF) did not have better health outcomes if they took sacubitril/valsartan combination therapy compared with valsartan alone, according to new data presented at the American College of Cardiology's 70th Annual Scientific Session.
Heart failure, a leading cause of hospitalization among adults over age 65, is a condition in which the heart becomes too weak to pump blood effectively to the rest of the body, causing fatigue and shortness of breath. For patients with severe heart failure, treatment options are limited to a mechanical heart pump or heart transplant. Doctors have sought ways to slow the progression of severe heart failure ...
2021-05-17
The likelihood of people surviving COVID-19 in UK hospitals has been improving over time, a new study has found.
Research published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine by the ISARIC Coronavirus Clinical Characterisation Consortium found that in-hospital mortality declined from 32% at the start of the first wave (Mar-Apr 2020) to 16% at the end of the first wave (Jun-Jul 2020).
In their study of 63,972 adults admitted to 247 UK hospitals the researchers found reductions in mortality were observed in all age groups, in all ethnic groups, for both sexes, and in patients with and without comorbidities. This improvement was ...
2021-05-17
A group of Brazilian and Portuguese researchers observed a correlation between the presence of lead in the organism and a microRNA (miRNA) that could be associated with the mechanisms that regulate DNA methylation, a physiological process required to control gene expression and ensure that genes function properly.
The alterations were detected in blood cells from workers in automotive battery plants, which use lead as a raw material. Curiously, lead levels in blood samples from 85 volunteers – averaging 20 micrograms per deciliter of blood (20 μg/dl) – were lower than the acceptable ceiling defined in Brazilian law (60 μg/dl).
The study was supported by FAPESP and ...
2021-05-17
A long noncoding RNA whose function was previously unknown turns out to play an important role in promoting the body's immune response against cancer and holds promise for enhancing the efficacy of anti-cancer immunotherapy.
That's according to new findings reported in Nature Cell Biology by researchers at the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center.
The group dubbed the RNA they identified LIMIT -- for long noncoding RNA inducing major histocompatibility complex class I and immunogenicity of tumor.
"LIMIT is easy to remember, but really it does the opposite. It stimulates immune functions against cancer," says senior study author Weiping Zou, M.D., Ph.D., the Charles B. de Nancrede Professor of Pathology, Immunology, Biology, and Surgery at U-M.
Only a small part of the human ...
2021-05-17
Researchers at the University of California, Davis, have found a link between traffic-related air pollution and an increased risk for age-related dementia, including Alzheimer's disease. Their study, based on rodent models, corroborates previous epidemiological evidence showing this association.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of age-related dementia and the sixth leading cause of death in the United States. More than 5 million Americans currently live with Alzheimer's disease -- a number that is expected to triple by 2050 as the population ages. ...
2021-05-17
In patients receiving therapeutic hypothermia after suffering out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, those who were cooled below 31 degrees Celsius (about 88 degrees Fahrenheit) for 24 hours showed no difference in terms of death or poor neurological outcomes at six months compared with patients receiving guideline-recommended cooling of 34 C (about 93 F). These findings are part of a study presented at the American College of Cardiology's 70th Annual Scientific Session.
Therapeutic hypothermia is a procedure in which a person's body is cooled far below normal body temperature. It has been shown to improve survival and reduce brain damage in people who have been resuscitated but remain comatose after suffering cardiac arrest (when the heart stops ...
2021-05-17
Sperm are generally viewed as having just one action in reproduction - to fertilise the female's egg - but studies at the University of Adelaide are overturning that view.
Published in Nature Research journal Communications Biology, new research shows that sperm also deliver signals directly to the female reproductive tissues to increase the chances of conception.
Robinson Research Institute's Professor Sarah Robertson, who led the project, said: "This research is the first to show that the female immune response is persuaded by signals in sperm to allow the male partner ...
2021-05-17
Marilyn Monroe famously sang that diamonds are a girl's best friend, but they are also very popular with quantum scientists - with two new research breakthroughs poised to accelerate the development of synthetic diamond-based quantum technology, improve scalability, and dramatically reduce manufacturing costs.
While silicon is traditionally used for computer and mobile phone hardware, diamond has unique properties that make it particularly useful as a base for emerging quantum technologies such as quantum supercomputers, secure communications and sensors.
However there are two key problems; cost, and difficulty in fabricating the single crystal diamond layer, which is smaller ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] An asthma vaccine effective in mice
