Intranasal vaccine protects mice against West Nile infection

This article explains how researchers have developed a nasal vaccine formulation that provides protective immunity against the West Nile virus infection in mice after only two doses. The researchers explain how only 2 vaccine doses provide a protective anti-WNV immunity. WNV is a mosquito-borne virus that can cause febrile illness, encephalitis (inflammation of the brain) or meningitis (inflammation of the lining of the brain and spinal cord). Even though the virus has been known to have been the cause of severe human disease for decades, it only appeared in the US in 1999. It has spread across the country, causing a reported 2,374 cases of infection in people, including 114 deaths in 2013 alone. Even though a vaccine has been made available for horses, there is no vaccine available for humans. The vaccine that is being used for mice is being prepared by mixing the antigen for HBV (hepatitis B virus) and adjuvant compounds in a water based (saline) solution. Researchers are now planning future studies in rabbits in order to continue developing the intranasal West Nile Virus vaccine. Rabbits have a nasal cavity size that is close to the size of the human nasal cavity and therefore an ideal model to further develop needle-free intranasal vaccines. This article comes across clearly. Even though the virus has been around for awhile, I am just learning about this now. It is clear that this is a dangerous disease that can cause severe illness and that vaccines are being made in order to prevent this disease. The author clearly explains the symptoms of the disease and how researchers have vaccines for horses and have just made vaccines for rats. He also clearly explains that they plan to research vaccines for rabbits because they have the same size nasal cavity as humans, which would be a future model. The only concept that was unclear was how is it that we are just learning about this virus? It has been apparently around for decades and just appeared in the US in 1999. The government needs to let the people know about this so that they can take precautions against the virus and hopefully not get infected. This was clearly unbiased, and the author is just simply stating the achievement this team of researchers have made into making a vaccine for rats against the West Nile Virus

Developments towards identifying impact of gut microbes

In this article on the Medical Xpress by Bob Yirka, he explains how a team of researchers at Washington School of Medicine has developed a method for identifying the impact that individual strains of microbes in the human gut have on the person housing them. Over the past few decades, scientists have come to realize that microbes in our guts play a far more important role in our lives than anyone might have thought of. Scientists know that microbes help ward off diseases and help digest our food, and they are also responsible for how much fat our bodies hold and for causing ailments such as colitis, Irritable Bowel Syndrome, or Crohn's Disease. If scientists figure out how the impact of gut microbes work, they can cure such diseases. In order to do this, scientists inject gut microbes into mice and this causes the mice to gain weight. The author does a good job of explaining how gut microbes work and how it can help us. He also explains the process of testing the mice very clearly and notes that with more scientific research, certain diseases can be cured. Nothing in the text was unclear, it was all straightforward and explanatory. This article is clearly unbiased, the author is clearly just explaining how gut microbes work and how scientists are on a breakthrough to figuring out how to cure diseases with them.

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"The Microbe" scienceblogs.com

Yo, this Kashif. This course is an FLC about Microbes and English 102. I didn't really know this was an microbe class, I thought it was biology in general. English 102 is learning how to write an argument and how to respond to it.