Latest Biological weapons Stories
DURHAM, N.C. "“ Researchers at Duke University Medical Center have identified a previously unknown family of virulence factors that make the bacterium responsible for the plague especially efficient at killing its host. In the process, the team not only demonstrated that the use of the common roundworm is a valid model for studying the virulence of Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague. They also showed that the interaction between Y. pestis and the worm is quite similar to what...
By Rosemary Arackaparambil BOMBAY (Reuters) - Hospitals in Bombay had admitted hundreds of people with fever and reported 26 deaths by Thursday, an official said, rekindling fears of an epidemic in India's financial capital weeks after the worst floods in history. More than 1,000 people were killed in the western Indian state of Maharasthra two weeks ago after record rain in the region triggered landslides and floods that brought Bombay, its capital, to a halt for a few days. A municipal...
TUNCELI, Turkey (Reuters) - More than two dozen people have been diagnosed with the anthrax infection in eastern Turkey after eating contaminated meat, prompting authorities to quarantine their village, health officials said on Friday. A boy, 10, and his sister, 9, were in critical condition, but there were no reports of deaths among the 27 people who came down with anthrax in Cukurca village in remote Bingol province, an official with the Bingol health department told Reuters. "Victims fell...
Waltham, MA "“ A new study of the disease burden of dengue fever in Malaysia strengthens the case for development of a vaccine against the mosquito-borne illness. Despite the nation's efforts at treatment and control, 10,000 cases are reported each year at a l cost of almost $13 million, slightly less than half for vector control and the rest for treating hospitalized patients with dengue fever, an often painful and sometimes fatal virus. These costs are equivalent to 940,000 lost workdays...
In one of the first molecular studies of the human antibody response to yellow fever, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) researchers and their colleagues have found the crucial bit of virus that people's immune systems need to spot and quash this often-fatal re-emerging disease. The findings may help scientists improve the existing vaccine, which has rare but severe side effects, said Jan ter Meulen, an HHMI international research scholar and associate professor of virology at Leiden...
Tulane researcher seeks to build a better bug trapFor almost an hour at a time, twice a day, two days a week in the deep heat of a Louisiana summer, Dawn Wesson stands in an urban backyard like a human scarecrow, arms spread wide, trying to attract mosquitoes.She wears no repellant, but she does wear full protective gear, including a lightweight coverall with head net and gloves. The two species of mosquitoes that can transmit yellow fever and dengue fever will be attracted to her odor and...
Research carried out with the participation of the University of Navarra has shown how a determinate molecule helps an important pathogen, Brucella abortus, escape destruction within the cells charged with eliminating infectious agents (macrophages). This research has been published in Nature Immunology scientific magazine. Brucella is a model of an intracellular parasite, a category that includes other important bacteria, such as those of tuberculosis or legionelosis. Brucella penetrates the...
Researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMB) have discovered a quick new way that mosquitoes can pass West Nile virus to each other. The new study challenges fundamental assumptions about the virus' transmission cycle and may help explain why it spread so rapidly across North America despite experts' predictions that it would progress more slowly or even die out. In the conventional understanding of West Nile transmission, mosquitoes acquire the virus when they...
New approach works in mice, but effectiveness in humans unknownHealthDay News -- American scientists say they've taken a step toward developing a vaccine against the plague, an ancient disease that could pose a new threat in the age of bioterrorism.The researchers say an experimental vaccine appears to protect mice against the inhaled form of the plague -- caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis -- raising hopes it might also work in humans.While specialists don't consider the disease to be...
PARIS (AFP) -- Scientists have unravelled the genome of the rice plant's greatest fungal menace, a harvest-wrecking foe that each year destroys the potential to feed 60 million people. Magnaporthe grisea is the first pathogenic plant fungus to have its genetic code unravelled, a feat that the researchers hope will open the way to newer, smarter and less damaging weapons against this menace. M. grisea, also called rice blast, comprises windborne spores that stick to the leaves of the rice...
Latest Biological weapons Reference Libraries
Francisella tularensis is a pathogenic species of gram-negative bacteria and the causative agent of tularemia or rabbit fever. It is a facultative intracellular bacterium. It is classified as a Class A agent by the U.S. government due to its ease of spread by aerosol and its high virulence. In 1911 the species was found in ground squirrels in California. There are four subspecies that have been classified. Biovar tularensis is found mostly in North America. Biovar palearctica is found...
Burkholderia pseudomallei is a Gram-negative, bipolar, aerobic, motile rod-shaped bacterium. It causes the disease melioidosis in humans and animals and is also capable of infecting plants. The bacteria can from in a number of artificial environments. Optimal temperature is around 40°C in pH-neutral or slightly acidic environments. Most strains can ferment sugars without gas formation. The bacteria produces both exo and endo toxins although the role of these toxins has not been fully...
Yellow fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic disease with a 40 to 50 nm enveloped RNA virus with positive sense of the Flaviviridae family. It is transmitted by the bite of female mosquitoes and is found in tropical and subtropical areas in South America and Africa, but not in Asia. Primates and a few kinds of mosquitoes are the only known hosts. The origin of the disease is most likely Africa. From there it was introduced to South America through the slave trade in the 16th century. There...
Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus is a mosquito-borne viral pathogen that causes Venezuelan equine encephalitis or encephalomyelitis (VEE). It can affect all equine species, such as horses, donkeys, and zebras. Equines may suddenly die or show progressive central nervous system disorders after infection. It is contractible by humans and will usually experience flu-like symptoms when infected. People with a weak immune system can become seriously ill or die. It is transmitted primarily...
Rinderpest (also cattle plague) is an infectious viral disease of cattle, domestic buffalo, and some species of wildlife. It is characterized by fever, oral erosions, diarrhea, lymphoid necrosis, and high mortality. The last confirmed case was in 2001. In 2011 it should be announced that a global eradication of rinderpest was complete. The term comes from the German language meaning cattle-plague. The rinderpest virus is closely related to measles and canine distemper viruses. It is a...
