A simple-to-apply, needle-free vaccine patch is being developed to protect people from the potentially deadly mosquito-borne Zika virus.

A prototype using The University of Queensland-developed and Vaxxas-commercialised high-density microarray patch (HD-MAP) has delivered a University of Adelaide-developed vaccine and elicited an effective immune response to Zika virus in mice.

University of Virginia School of Medicine researchers have discovered how Lactobacillus, a bacterium found in fermented foods and yogurt, helps the body manage stress and may help prevent depression and anxiety. The findings open the door to new therapies to treat anxiety, depression and other mental-health conditions.

The new research from UVA's Alban Gaultier, Ph.D., and collaborators is notable because it pinpoints the role of Lactobacillus, separating it out from all the other microorganisms that naturally live in and on our bodies.

A new AI (Artificial Intelligence) tool may make it possible to spare breast cancer patients unnecessary chemotherapy treatments by using a more precise method of predicting their outcomes, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study.

AI evaluations of patient tissues were better at predicting the future course of a patient’s disease than evaluations performed by expert pathologists.

Lidocaine - often used as numbing agent for outpatient medical procedures - activates certain bitter taste receptors through two unique mechanisms that result in cancer cell death, according to researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Their findings, published in Cell Reports, pave the way for a clinical trial to test the addition of lidocaine to the standard of care therapy for patients with head and neck cancers.

Infections with antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a growing global problem. Part of the solution may lie in copying the bacteria's own weapons. The research environment in Tromsø has found a new bacteriocin, in a very common skin bacterium. Bacteriocin inhibits the growth of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that are often the cause of disease and can be difficult to treat.

It has been uncertain how Mycobacterium tuberculosis deflects the immune response in humans, though evidence has pointed to host immunometabolism - the intrinsic link between metabolism in immune cells and their immune function. The pathogen M. tuberculosis is known to disrupt a metabolic pathway called glycolysis in infected myeloid cells, which include macrophages, through an unclear mechanism.

Vitamin B12 is a well-known micronutrient that has long been acknowledged for its essential role in maintaining nerve function, supporting red blood cell production, and facilitating DNA synthesis, all vital processes for overall health. Researchers led by Dr. Manuel Serrano at IRB Barcelona have now revealed that vitamin B12 also plays a pivotal role in cellular reprogramming and tissue regeneration.