Inserm Newsroom - Press room of the French national institute of health and medical research

Calpains, key cellular enzymes for fighting influenza

Why not fight the influenza virus by blocking the cellular machinery it uses for replication? Researchers from Inserm (Unit 1100, “Respiratory Pathologies: Proteolysis and Aerosoltherapy”), Institut Pasteur and the HKU-Pasteur Research Pole in Hong Kong tested this hypothesis by specifically targeting the calpains, proteases involved in inflammatory mechanisms. Their results, obtained in animals, show that inhibiting these enzymes can not only reduce the symptoms of the disease, but also prevent infection by seasonal or pandemic influenza viruses.

A study reveals a new target in the treatment of chronic inflammatory bowel disease: the fungal microbiota

A team of researchers (AP-HP, AVENIR-ATIP–Inserm team[1], INRA[2], UPMC[3]) led by Dr Harry Sokol, from the Department of Gastroenterology and Nutrition, Saint Antoine Hospital, AP-HP, used a high-throughput sequencing method to show an imbalance in the fungal microbiota of patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), with variations according to the type of disease and topography of lesions. The fungal component (made up of moulds and yeasts) of the microbiota has still received only very little attention, despite the existence of considerable evidence implicating it in the occurrence of this type of disease.

This work was published online in the journal Gut on 4 February 2016.

New study reveals incidence of dementia may be declining

Despite the concern of an explosion of dementia cases in an aging population over the next few decades, a new study, based on data from the Framingham Heart Study (FHS), suggests that the rate of new cases of dementia actually may be decreasing.

Forensic odorology scientifically validated

Odorology is a technique that uses specially-trained dogs to identify human scent. It is used in police investigations to establish that an individual has been at the scene of a crime. However, there is no international norm on how these dogs are trained. At the Centre de recherche en neurosciences de Lyon (CNRS/Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1/Inserm), researchers specializing in scents and their memorization have analyzed data, provided since 2003 by the Division of the Technical and Scientific Police (DTSP, Ecully) on dog performances in scent identification tasks. Their results show that, at the end of a 24-month training program, the dogs are able to recognize the smell of an individual in 80-90% of cases and never mistake it for that of another. These findings validate the procedures that are currently in use and should convince the international community of the reliability of this method. This work was published on 10 February 2016 in the journal PLOS ONE.

Sunday 14 February 2016: Heart Day

As the cause of 17.5 million deaths in 2012, cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of mortality worldwide.[1] In France they are the second leading cause of mortality in men, and the leading cause in women.

Sunday 14 February 2016: Heart Day

  These diseases are a group of disorders of the heart and blood vessels, such as hypertension, coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular disease (stroke), peripheral arterial disease, heart failure, rheumatic heart disease, congenital heart disease and cardiomyopathy. Heart Day, initiated by Alliance du Cœur and held on 14 February every year, the symbolic date of St. […]

New phase of the Elfe study : an original study on learning in nursery school children !

In spring 2016, a new phase in the Elfe Child Cohort Study will take place in French nursery schools, with participation by middle-year teaching staff. Its objective: to collect information on early learning by children of approximately 5 years of age. It will hence be possible to analyse the manner in which children enter the various areas of learning provided by nursery schools, taking living conditions, family structures, and the child’s health and development into account.

This “School” component of the Elfe study calls for participation by teachers via playful exercises in the areas of reading and numbers, prepared by the researchers.

New phase of the Elfe study : an original study on learning in nursery school children !

The place of the School survey in monitoring the Elfe child cohort Elfe is the first French study devoted to monitoring children from birth to adult age, which addresses the many aspects of their development and socialisation from the social sciences, health and environment perspective. When it was launched at national level in 2011, over […]

Breast cancer—what part do behavioural factors play?

Researchers at Unit 1018 “Centre for Research in Epidemiology and Population Health” (Inserm/Paris-Sud University) at Gustave Roussy have focused on the proportion of breast cancers attributable to various risk factors. The analysis, conducted among 67,634 women in the French E3N cohort, shows that postmenopausal breast cancers are more often attributable to “behavioural” factors, such as an unhealthy diet, excess weight and alcohol consumption than “non-behavioural” factors. These data suggest that by preventing these behaviour patterns, the number of breast cancers during menopause would decrease.
The article detailing these findings is published in the International Journal of Cancer, 04 February 2016.

Alzheimer’s disease: a new immunotherapy approach?

A study conducted on mice by researchers at Inserm and UPMC (Pierre and Marie Curie University) offers a new type of immunotherapy approach for treating Alzheimer’s disease. This involves amplifying a specific population of T lymphocytes that regulate immune and neuroinflammatory mechanisms that develop during the disease.

These results are published in the journal Brain.