- 2018
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Press releases - 14.08.2018
2018 Ebola Epidemics: What is the Latest in Vaccine Research?
Since July, a new outbreak of Ebola virus disease was identified in the Democratic Republic of the Congo – the second since May. In an attempt to halt the outbreak, a new vaccination campaign has begun in the affected region of North Kivu. It is against this background that researchers from the consortium PREVAC (Partnership for Research on Ebola VACcination) take stock of advances in Ebola vaccine research in The Lancet and point to the necessity to continue clinical trials.
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Press releases - 06.08.2018
Mice’s individuality is influenced by their relations
Individuality exists in all animals, and a number of factors shape it over time. For mice, one of those factors is the social environment, as researchers at CNRS, INSERM and Sorbonne Université have just shown. In this species, some stable character traits may even be inscribed in an individual’s neuron activity and change when the group’s composition changes. These results are published on August 6, 2018 in Nature Communication.
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Press releases - 02.08.2018
Alcohol Consumption and Risk of Dementia
The conclusions of a new study coordinated by Inserm show that excessive long-term alcohol consumption is linked to an increased risk of dementia. The results also suggest an increased risk among those who abstain, even if the underlying mechanisms in the two groups are very likely to differ. With those consuming to excess, the cases of hospitalization for chronic alcohol-related disease were linked to a four times higher risk of dementia, while in the abstainers this risk is only 1.5 times higher and can be explained in part by an increased risk of cardiometabolic disease. These results were published in British Medical Journal based on data from the British Whitehall II cohort.
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Press releases - 25.07.2018
Resistance to Antidepressants: the Ability of Neurons to Self-regulate
Why are some depressed patients more or less totally resistant to the most commonly-prescribed antidepressants? This question was addressed by researchers from Inserm
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Press releases - 23.07.2018
In Mice, Exposure to Chlordecone has Transgenerational Effects on Sperm Production
A study coordinated by Inserm researchers at the Research Institute for Environmental and Occupational Health in Rennes shows that exposing pregnant mice to chlordecone affects the third generation of their male progeny
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Press releases - 20.07.2018
When a Gut Bacterium Aggravates Metabolic Syndrome and a Probiotic Relieves It
While it is evident that obesity, type 2 diabetes and other metabolic complications are current public health issues, their prevalence is much less clear. A team of researchers from Inra, Danone, the Paris public hospital system (AP-HP), Inserm and Sorbonne Université have recently revealed, in an in vivo preclinical study, that the metabolic disorders linked to a high fat diet are aggravated by the proliferation of Bilophila wadsworthia, a pro-inflammatory gut bacterium which contributes to the deterioration of the intestinal barrier. These effects are attenuated by a probiotic bacterium known as Lactobacillus rhamnosus CNCM I-3690. The findings of this study pave the way for the development of nutritional approaches and probiotics which target the microbiota. They were published on July 18, 2018 in Nature Communications.
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Press releases - 11.07.2018
Obesity: Using the Microbiota to Fight the Harmful Effects of Fatty Liver
Day after day, the microbiota continues to yield its secrets. In a new study published in Nature Medicine, Rémy Burcelin, Inserm Research Director at the Institute of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases (Inserm/UPS) along with researchers from Inserm Paris, Imperial College London, Girona Hospital and University of Rome Tor Vergata, show how certain gut bacteria cause the accumulation of fat in the liver and play a major role in fatty liver disease (hepatic steatosis). This research could ultimately lead to the availability of biomarkers to predict the disease and proposed therapeutic solutions based on nutritional, and pharmacological approaches and a new generation of probiotics.
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Press releases - 02.07.2018
Chronic liver disease: discovery of the role of T cell mucosa-associated invariant (MAIT) in inflammation and fibrosis
In collaboration with the team “Inflammation and stress in liver disease” of the Research Center for Inflammation (UMR 1149-Inserm-Université Paris Diderot), teams of Hepatology Services, anesthesia and resuscitation ‘pathology Beaujon hospital AP-HP, Paris Diderot University and the Cochin Institute (1016 UMR Inserm-University Paris Descartes), demonstrated that a specific population of T cells, called “MAIT “played a major role in inflammation and fibrosis associated with chronic liver disease.
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Press releases - 01.07.2018
Cost-effective universal screening for hepatitis C in France
An estimated 75 000 people in France are unaware they are infected by hepatitis C virus. An ANRS-funded study by Sylvie Deuffic-Burban, a research associate at IAME (Infection, Antimicrobials, Modeling, Evolution) (Inserm – Université Paris Diderot – Université Paris 13), and her team shows that a universal screening strategy applied to hepatitis C is cost-effective and improves life expectancy in those infected, compared with targeted screening. These modeling results will be published on 1st July 2018 in Journal of Hepatology.
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Press releases - 28.06.2018
A new twist on how parasites invade host cells
Des chercheurs du CNRS, de l’Inserm et de l’Université Grenoble Alpes viennent de décrypter les mécanismes déployés par le parasite Toxoplasma gondii pour pénétrer dans les cellules de ses hôtes. À l’aide d’une imagerie quantitative à haute vitesse et haute résolution, ils ont identifié un mouvement singulier du parasite qui lui permet de fermer derrière lui la porte qu’il a créée pour rentrer dans la cellule-hôte et s’y nicher. Ces travaux, à l’interface de la biologie cellulaire, de la parasitologie et de la biophysique, sont publiés dans Cell Host & Microbes le 28 juin 2018.