Infection Biology

The viruses can lie dormant within a multicellular host genome, reactivate on cue, and be inherited like a super-gene 

Jason Hendry from the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin, documents a two week trip to Burkina Faso. He is collaborating with researchers from the Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Santé (IRSS) to help find ways to prevent the spread of drug-resistant malaria.

Researchers have deciphered the process by which the influenza virus steals the cap of the host RNA to replicate

Leishmania pathogens require the protein TKUL to maintain infection in host cells. TKUL combines two enzymes in one molecule. This structural peculiarity could be used for novel therapies.  

Livestock played a role in prehistoric plague infections

A new study has reconstructed two 4000-year-old genomes from the rare pathogen Mycobacterium lepromatosis

Maria Sokolova, head of the Lise Meitner Research Group Bacteriophages at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry, receives this year's Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize 2025

Researchers reveal new insights into the how the matrix layer of HIV-1 becomes mature

For the first time, researchers have observed how HIV penetrates the nuclear pores to the genome of human immune cells

Syphilis originated in the Americas prior to the arrival of Columbus, and European colonialism made it globally dominant

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Researchers have deciphered the process by which the influenza virus steals the cap of the host RNA to replicate

Livestock played a role in prehistoric plague infections

A new study has reconstructed two 4000-year-old genomes from the rare pathogen Mycobacterium lepromatosis

Maria Sokolova, head of the Lise Meitner Research Group Bacteriophages at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry, receives this year's Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize 2025

Researchers reveal new insights into the how the matrix layer of HIV-1 becomes mature

For the first time, researchers have observed how HIV penetrates the nuclear pores to the genome of human immune cells

Syphilis originated in the Americas prior to the arrival of Columbus, and European colonialism made it globally dominant

Scientists reconstruct ancient genomes of the two most deadly malaria parasites, Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum

Viruses keep the most common marine bacteria in check

When a wave of infection reaches its peak depends, among other things, on seasonal temperature fluctuations and changes in contact rates

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Admittedly, the research subject isn’t particularly appetizing: Strongyloides stercoralis – small parasitic worms that live in their host’s intestines and have the potential to cause severe problems. Nevertheless, Adrian Streit from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Tübingen is fascinated by this threadworm. It has a unique life cycle, and to this day, no one really understands why

Salmonella enterica, the bacterium responsible for enteric fever, may be the long-debated cause of the 1545-1550 AD “cocoliztli” epidemic in Oaxaca, Mexico that heavily affected the native population.

Max Planck scientists discover novel innate surveillance mechanism to fight off pathogenic Helicobacter strains

New mechanism of stomach gland regeneration reveals impact of Helicobacter pylori infection

Researchers illuminate the epidemiology of a cryptic pathogen

Max Planck scientists fulfil a key requirement for further research on Zika virus and for the production of vaccines

Household income and knowledge about health risks drive the consumption of wild animal meat in West Africa

For Emmanuelle Charpentier, deciphering the functioning of an enzyme previously known only to experts was a life-changing moment

Wolfgang Fiedler, an ornithologist at the Radolfzell Ornithological Station, pleads for more research leading to a better understanding of transmission paths

The mavirus provides single-celled organisms with immunity against a giant virus

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