is a spin-out company from the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology () and the Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies (), partners of - and supported by - the European Commission’s programme.

INBRAIN’s work involves the decoding of brain signals by implanting innovative, flexible nanoscale graphene electrodes, developed in conjunction with researchers at Swag直播’s Nanomedicine Lab and the  (NGI).

These signals may then be used to produce a therapeutic, personalised response for patients with epilepsy, Parkinson’s and other neurological disorders.

This new investment is co-led by Barcelona-based venture capitalists Asabys Partners and Alta Life Sciences, joined by: Vsquared Ventures, a deep tech-focused early-stage venture capitalist based in Munich; TruVenturo GmbH, Germany’s most successful internet company builders; and CDTI, the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation.

Fruits of long collaboration

Kostas Kostarelos, Professor of Nanomedicine at Swag直播 , the NGI and co-founder of INBRAIN Neuroelectronics, said: ‘’This investment for INBRAIN is a testament that graphene-based technologies and the properties of 2D materials have a unique set of propositions to offer for clinical medicine and the management of neurological disorders.

“This did not happen suddenly, though, or by a stroke of good luck in the lab,” he added. “It is the culmination of many years of persistent and consistent work between at least three research institutions, one of which is the Nanomedicine Lab in Swag直播, the other two in Barcelona, all working closely and cooperatively under the critically important funding of the Graphene Flagship project.”

The Graphene Flagship is the European Commission’s €1bn research funding spearhead and a key partner of ICN2, ICREA and Graphene@Swag直播, with a mission is to accelerate advanced 2D materials research and commercialisation.

High costs of brain disease

The high incidence of brain-related diseases worldwide and their huge annual cost - around £700bn in Europe alone, according to a 2010 study by the European Brain Council - call for greater investments in basic research in this field, with the aim of developing new and more efficient therapeutic and diagnostic tools.

Existing brain interfaces are based on metals such as platinum and iridium, which significantly restrict miniaturisation and signal resolution, and are therefore responsible for considerable side effects.

As a consequence, there is a 50% rejection rate of these implants in candidate patients. INBRAIN Neuroelectronics has a disruptive technology proposition, based on the novel material graphene, that overcomes the current limitations of metal-based neural interfaces.

Graphene electrodes allow miniaturisation to nanoscale, with the potential to reach single-neuron resolution. The extraordinary properties of graphene - which is light, biocompatible, flexible and extremely conductive - are harnessed in much smaller devices, which are safer to implant and can be programmed, upgraded and recharged wirelessly.

Driven by artificial intelligence, the implant can learn from the brain of the specific patient and trigger adaptive responses to deliver a personalised neurological therapy. In addition, the use of big data management will permit remote monitoring of the device and data processing.

Better patient outcomes

Carolina Aguilar, founder and CEO of INBRAIN (pictured centre with team, above), said: “Patients with chronic conditions are alone with their diseases, at most they see their physician 1-4 times per year for a follow-up. With less invasive and more intelligent neuroelectronic therapies, we aim to provide safer and real-time adaptive therapies to empower them and improve the outcomes that matter to them.

“This way patients can better deal with their condition between follow-up visits, by getting the right therapy and support when they need it.”

The technology has already been validated in vitro and in vivo, with extensive biocompatibility and toxicity tests mainly performed in Swag直播 using preclinical models. This significant investment will be dedicated to bring the technology to human patients, with the execution of multiple clinical trials in collaboration with key neurosurgical and neurological groups in Europe, including various NHS hospitals.

 is one of Swag直播’s  - examples of pioneering discoveries, interdisciplinary collaboration and cross-sector partnerships that are tackling some of the biggest questions facing the planet. #ResearchBeacons

Swag直播 has announced today a groundbreaking gene therapy partnership to ease the lifelong suffering of people with Hunter syndrome.

The University has agreed to a worldwide license and collaborative research funding agreement with ., a leading clinical-stage gene therapy company with a mission to free people from a lifetime of genetic disease, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.

The significant partnership agreement is for the clinical development of an investigational lentiviral gene therapy for mucopolysaccharidosis type II (MPS II), or Hunter syndrome, a rare and deadly lysosomal disorder that primarily affects young boys.

Hunter syndrome, which affects an estimated , causes devastating complications throughout the body and brain, including severe cardiac and respiratory dysfunction, skeletal malformations and hearing impairment. Children with severe cases of Hunter syndrome typically show early symptoms in their toddler years and begin to regress developmentally around age six, losing basic motor skills and cognitive function.

The current standard of care is weekly enzyme replacement therapy (ERT), which can delay some complications but does not halt overall progression of the disease and has not been demonstrated to address cognitive issues. Even with ERT, people with Hunter syndrome face life-limiting symptoms and a significantly reduced life span.

Swag直播 will sponsor the investigator-led Phase 1-2 clinical trial for Hunter syndrome which is expected to begin in 2021. The Hunter syndrome program was developed by Brian Bigger, a professor of cell and gene therapy at Swag直播. Professor Bigger has published preclinical data demonstrating that the introduction of the transgene with an optimised, proprietary tag has the ability to correct peripheral disease and normalise brain pathology.

Primary investigators for the clinical trial will be; Professor Robert Wynn, Consultant Paediatric Hematologist at the and Dr. Simon Jones, Consultant Paediatric Physician for inherited metabolic diseases at the Willink Unit, and the .

“We feel an enormous urgency to bring forward a treatment that may halt this deadly disease in its tracks, before symptoms emerge and before children lose their physical and cognitive skills,” said Professor Bigger. “We are delighted to be working with AVROBIO on this program. Both of our teams have deep experience running international clinical trials in other lysosomal disorders. AVROBIO also has a leading gene therapy platform, plato®, which is designed to optimise the consistency, predictability and efficacy of its gene therapies and to enable efficient scaling for worldwide commercialization. By working together, we believe we can greatly accelerate development of this important program.”

The investigational gene therapy, which will be called AVR-RD-05, involves ex vivo transduction of the patient’s own hematopoietic stem cells with a therapeutic transgene designed to express functional enzyme the patient needs to maintain cellular health, coupled to a proprietary protein tag that is designed to improve stability of the enzyme in the bloodstream and facilitate uptake by tissues from head to toe. When reinfused into the patient, the gene-modified stem cells are expected to engraft in the bone marrow and produce generations of daughter cells, each carrying the transgene. Those daughter cells are then expected to differentiate into macrophages, microglia and other components of the immune system and circulate throughout the body and central nervous system, potentially enabling widespread distribution of functional enzyme.

Geoff MacKay, AVROBIO’s president and CEO said: “The lentiviral gene therapy approach is well suited to treat a progressive and pervasive disease such as Hunter syndrome, which affects organs throughout the body and severely impairs cognitive function. If we treat children early, before their symptoms arise, we hope to prevent the tragic complications that rob these young children of their futures.

“We believe our deep experience with investigational gene therapies for lysosomal disorders will enable us to efficiently move the program through clinical development in collaboration with Professor Brian Bigger, who has done tremendous work to develop and optimize this investigational gene therapy. We’re proud to add this program to our leading lysosomal disorder pipeline and excited about its potential to change the lives of patients and families living with Hunter syndrome.”

Swag直播’s technology transfer office, The and AVROBIO have negotiated the exclusive, worldwide license to the technology. Under the terms of the license, AVROBIO will pay Swag直播 an upfront cash payment and additional payments based on the achievement of development and regulatory milestones. The company will pay The University a mid-single digit percentage royalty on annual net sales of licensed products. Additionally, under the collaborative research funding agreement, AVROBIO will cover budgeted clinical trial costs.

Andrew Wilkinson, CEO of the University’s technology transfer company, Swag直播 Innovation Factory said: “We are delighted that AVROBIO will be working with teams from Swag直播 and Swag直播 Foundation Trust to develop a therapy for this debilitating genetic disease. AVROBIO’s strategic focus on bringing new personalised gene therapies to the world along with their technical and commercial expertise in this area make them an excellent partner for the investigational Hunter syndrome gene therapy programme.”

World-leading Swag直播 researchers are working towards developing a test for COVID-19 that could be used at home like a domestic pregnancy test.

This prototype test is based on the fact sugars coat all human cells and could be used in the fight to detect infectious agents like coronavirus.

This new screening new approach can help identify the COVID-19 virus - not by its genetic code, which can mutate, but by using its reliance on chains of sugars on human cells, which are constant.

Sugars coat all cells in the human body and they are the first layer a bacteria or virus encounters. Professor Rob Field and his team are interested in how to use the sugars to identify and even block a virus from penetrating the cell – and so preventing further infection.

The simple-to-use testing device has the potential to be used in 'hotspot' communities like frontline NHS staff allowing doctors and nurses to easily test at home to see if they have COVID-19 symptoms or not before going to work.

Communities associated with a building or geographical location which require increased safeguarding such as, hospitals, care homes or workplaces, can quickly test visitors.

Professor Field and his team at Swag直播 are now working at pace with spin-out company to get their new test ready and officially validated ready for the autumn. An autumn launch this year is key, as the application of this screening kit can support diagnoses of 'flu vs coronavirus', given the typical trend of flu season which can initially present similar symptoms.

The tester would be very useful to ensure people with seasonal flu aren't confused with people having suspected COVID-19 and the consequences of having to self-isolate and create a new round of disruption to society and the economy.

Prof Field said: “Our existing prototype product for influenza can detect the virus in less than 20 minutes and could be adapted to identify other pathogens such as coronavirus.

“Respiratory viruses invade the body through cells in the airways and lungs. These cells are covered in a coat of sugar chains, known as glycans, which are used for normal function of human tissues. Viruses can utilise these glycans as part of the infection process.”

This process can also be used in reverse to identify the virus in saliva or nasal fluids, said Professor Field, a world expert in glycoscience at the (MIB) - and his specialist company has developed this diagnostic technique that uses an artificial glycan receptor to capture a virus.

Professor Field added: “Right now, everybody is talking about a vaccine for coronavirus but vaccine development, validation, safety-testing, manufacture, regulatory approval and deployment is a time-consuming process.

“A low-cost, easy to use screening test that can be performed at the point of care would be an ideal way to limit initial disease transmission in the community and at points of entry to hospitals, or at national borders, for instance.

“Current COVID-19 tests are largely based on PCR (polymerase chain reaction) that requires a laboratory setting for analysis and relies on prior knowledge of the viral genetic code. This code can change as the virus evolves, potentially limiting the effectiveness of the test.

“The Iceni Diagnostics approach uses glycan recognition, which is unaffected by seasonal variation in the genetic code, and can be offered as a handheld home or field-based test.”

Professor Field and his dedicated team have already developed a series of prototype products that can specifically detect pathogens such as Norovirus and different strains of influenza in less than 20 minutes. The team based at MIB will be working with Iceni Diagnostics to further develop these tests in the coming months.

The hand-held device currently under development uses lateral flow – like a home pregnancy test – to give a simple yes/no answer. It requires no refrigeration and no training, meaning the test is usable in any location, by any person, in order to detect flu or other pathogens.

“The current Iceni Diagnostics products detect a single virus. However, the next generation of diagnostics will enable the detection and discrimination of a series of pathogens that give rise to similar symptoms.

“This would enable, for example, a distinction between flu and COVID-19 in a single sample which increases the versatility and robustness of the diagnosis. Additionally, the way the virus interacts with its glycan receptor makes it seasonally consistent, so, even if the virus genetic code mutates, it will still be detected – meaning the Iceni Diagnostics’ test should remain effective in the longer term.”

Professor Field says that the device under development holds huge promise for changing the way we manage global disease: “This new approach, which is based on host-pathogen glycan recognition could potentially result in a more universal detection technique, crucial in early diagnostics of outbreaks.”

Swag直播 has a growing list of scientists and academics who are either working on aspects of the COVID-19 outbreak or can make a valuable contribution to the national discourse. Please checkout our p. 

Our people are also  and with partners from across society to understand coronavirus (COVID-19) and its wide-ranging impacts on our lives.  to support the University’s response to coronavirus or visit the University’s  to lend a helping hand.

New research has revealed new insights into common asthma aerosol treatments to aid the drug’s future improvements which could benefit hundreds of millions of global sufferers.

Lung diseases such as asthma are a major global health issue, with an estimated 330 million asthma sufferers worldwide. The most effective treatments are through direct inhalation of medicine to the lungs. However, generating the aerosols for inhalation is a scientific challenge because of our limited knowledge of the microstructure of drug products before they are aerosolised.

In new research announced today University of Swag直播-based scientists demonstrate how they have used x-ray CT scanning to quantify the tiny microstructures of individual particles from the drug product at the nano-scale.

This is the first time that the 3D microstructure has been revealed and gives scientists and pharmaceutical producers a better understanding of the behaviour of the drug product under aerosolisation.

Lead author of the research, Dr Parmesh Gajjar said: “We have been able to visualise a drug-blend in 3D, and see the interplay between drug and non-drug particles in the medicine. This is important for final quality control of asthma medicines to check the actual amount of drug and to help formulate improved asthma medications.”

Due to the new technological innovation the findings was announced at the conference. The groups work was selected to be a key presentation at the global conference, originally scheduled to take place in Palm Springs but now occurring in a digital format as a result of the global COVID19 pandemic.

The work was made possible through the high-resolution x-ray computed tomography (XCT) instruments in the word leading (HMXIF) at Swag直播 that provide the capability to analyse a sample at up to 50 nanometres in resolution.

This is particularly important for the inhalation medicines which require aersolisation to generate particles small enough to be adsorb via the lungs. In this project the particles measured less than 5 µm to reach the deepest parts of the lungs.

The work is part of a funded national collaboration “INFORM 2020” between the Universities of Herfordshire, Swag直播, Leeds and Cambridge, with the support of 3M, Astra Zeneca, Glaxo Smith Kline, Malvern Panalytical and Carl Zeiss Microscopy that is seeking to revolutionise our fundamental understanding of Asthma medications for the design of more effective therapies.

Swag直播 is repurposing specialised equipment across its campus to help produce safety equipment for NHS workers battling COVID-19 in an attempt to help reduce the critical demand across the region.

In a combined effort with other universities, including Salford and MMU, The University is utilising 3D printing capabilities to design and make headbands for protective facemasks worn by frontline NHS medical staff in hospitals.

With nearly 50 printers across the University it is aimed that around 500 additional mask headbands can be produced per week. The face shield is being laser cut by regional commercial suppliers and assembled at .

Professor Brian Derby is coordinating the 3D printing response at Swag直播, he said: “3D printing has allowed the Greater Swag直播-based team to progress rapidly from concept, to prototypes, which allowed infection control teams to validate the design and enable the production of PPE acceptable for use in the regions hospitals.”

A team of experimental officers and technical staff who can operate the 3D printers have volunteered to work on site to help with the surge in demand. Measured steps are being taken in an effort to reduce staff travel to minimise risk. NHS staff will collect the masks from the University campus on a daily basis to help resupply their essential stock of PPE.

Swag直播 is assisting the NHS by mobilising its staff, laboratory space and equipment as part of a collective effort to combat the COVID-19 pandemic in a fast moving and rapidly changing situation.

Swag直播 has established a COVID-19 research rapid response group through which scientists are working with NHS colleagues from Swag直播 University NHS Foundation Trust and the , supported by , and utilising our experimental and translational research expertise through the NHIR Swag直播  and .

Much sought after personal protective equipment (PPE) is also being donated by the University in the midst of a global shortage. Some high-spec or environmentally controlled laboratories including biomedical labs and graphene cleanroom labs, require users to wear PPE including; goggles, gloves and facemasks.

A stock of PPE including 47,660 pairs of nitrile gloves and 200 pairs of protective goggles has now been donated to local health practices to help safeguard doctors and nurses with further stock to be audited and offered.

Elsewhere the which is based at Swag直播 and with national links to industry and academia has put out to link industry partners with NHS colleagues in order to help industry understand and solve problems faced by the nation’s medical staff in a rapidly changing environment caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

At Swag直播, our people are working together and with partners from across society to understand coronavirus (COVID-19) and its wide-ranging impacts on our lives. to support the University’s response to coronavirus or visit the University’s  to lend a helping hand.

Users of a new health and wellbeing app are contributing to a publicly-available of people with COVID-19 symptoms, providing a national picture of the outbreak and its spread over time.

The app was developed by UK company, , in collaboration with data and health scientists. As more people add their responses to the data, the accurate information provided will help fight the virus. The data is being shared with leading universities, including Swag直播, who will analyse it with the NHS.

Swag直播’s Professor Tjeerd Van Staa and Dr Ian Hall are among those analysing the data. Dr Hall, a Reader in Mathematical Staistics said: “Evergreen Life users are supporting a better understanding of the local experience of COVID19 disease through sharing their data which will be incredibly useful to national and local planning."

The data, based on 25,548 responses shows that at March 27, 10.4% of respondents had reported having the symptoms consistent with COVID-19, up from 8.1% in the initial survey on Sunday 22nd, before lockdown was announced.

Before lockdown, 53% with symptoms were staying at home and after lockdown 89% with symptoms are reporting they are staying at home - showing that the overwhelming majority of those with symptoms are now acting on government advice to self-isolate.

Dr Hall added: “This is an exciting emerging data stream and I look forward to helping interpret the data, with colleagues in Swag直播 and Liverpool, as it provides situational awareness to users and policy makers alike.”

Dr Hall is also one of a special task force of statisticians who have been analysing data models from the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak to help inform UK Government policy and response. They specialise on risk to communities that are in enclosed places, such as prisons or large vessels like a cruise ship; as well as analysing highly social communities found in schools to much smaller social environments, like our family homes.

Evergreen Life CEO Stephen Critchlow says: “We’ve asked our 750,000 users to help build a heat map of those with symptoms of COVID-19 to help the NHS and researchers better understand how the virus is moving and spreading around the UK. We’ve already heard from over 25,000 people and the questionnaire has been completed over 40,000 times.

“We have compared the situation before and after lockdown. It shows that while many more people are now staying at home, the number of people reporting symptoms has risen from 8.1% to 10.4%.

Users of the app, available from , are being asked to report if they are self-isolating, have a dry cough or a temperature. The anonymised data is being used to create a national picture of those reporting symptoms. People will also be asked to report when they recover to enable further data analysis as the outbreak progresses. App users are also sent personalised information on national guidance, to support them, and optimise their wellbeing. The platform will also be offered to give the special advice from the NHS for users within the 1.5m people with the greatest risk of complications.

Digital health is one of most vibrant research areas at Swag直播, building on an exceptionally strong track record with more than 40 years of interdisciplinary research. The University has world-leading capabilities in engineering and research methodology for digital health technologies, as shown through the  at the School of Computer Science.

The Heat Map is available .

At Swag直播, our people are working together and with partners from across society to understand coronavirus (COVID-19) and its wide-ranging impacts on our lives. to support the University’s response to coronavirus or visit the University’s  to lend a helping hand.

New antiviral materials made from sugar have been developed to destroy viruses on contact and may help in the fight against viral outbreaks.

This new development from a collaborative team of international scientists shows promise for the treatment of herpes simplex (cold sore virus), respiratory syncytial virus, hepatitis C, HIV, and Zika virus to name a few. The team have demonstrated success treating a range of viruses in the lab – including respiratory infections to genital herpes.

The research is a result of a collaboration between scientists from Swag直播, the  (UNIGE) and the  in Lausanne, Switzerland. Although at a very early stage of development, the broad spectrum activity of this new approach could also be effective against newly prevalent viral diseases such as the recent coronavirus outbreak.

So called ‘virucidal’ substances, such as bleach, are typically capable of destroying viruses on contact but are extremely toxic to humans and so cannot be taken or applied to the human body without causing severe harm. Developing virucides from sugar has allowed for the advent of a new type of antiviral drug, which destroys viruses yet is non-toxic to humans.

Current antiviral drugs work by inhibiting virus growth, but they are not always reliable as viruses can mutate and become resistant to these treatments.

Using modified sugar molecules the team showed that the outer shell of a virus can be disrupted, thereby destroying the infectious particles on contact, as oppose to simply restricting its growth. This new approach has also been shown to defend against drug resistance.

Publishing their work in the journal  the team showed that they successfully engineered new modified molecules using natural glucose derivatives, known as cyclodextrins. The molecules attract viruses before breaking them down on contact, destroying the virus and fighting the infection.

Dr Samuel Jones, from Swag直播 and a member of the  for Advanced Materials, jointly led the pioneering research with Dr Valeria Cagno from the University of Geneva. “We have successfully engineered a new molecule, which is a modified sugar that shows broad-spectrum antiviral properties. The antiviral mechanism is virucidal meaning that viruses struggle to develop resistance. As this is a new type of antiviral and one of the first to ever show broad-spectrum efficacy, it has potential to be a game changer in treating viral infections.” said Sam.

Professor Caroline Tapparel from the University of Geneva and Prof Francesco Stellacci from EPFL were both also senior authors of the study. Prof Tapparel declared: “We developed a powerful molecule able to work against very different viruses, therefore, we think this could be game changing also for emerging infections.”

The molecule is patented and a spin-out company is being set up to continue pushing this new antiviral towards real-world use. With further testing the treatment could find a use in creams, ointments and nasal sprays or other similar treatments for viral infections. This exciting new material can work to break down multiple viruses making for cost-effective new treatments even for resistant viruses.

The paper, Modified Cyclodextrins as Broad-spectrum Antivirals, by Jones et al is published in Science Advances.

Hereditary spastic paraplegias (HSP) are a group of genetic disorders that cause weakness and stiffness in the leg muscles. Generally symptoms gradually get worse over time, and severely affected patients are wheelchair dependent.

Changes in several genes are known to cause HSP. However, the underlying cause in a substantial number of patients remains unknown. Currently, there is no cure for HSP.

Via human genetic studies and international collaboration, teams in Swag直播 and Amsterdam worked together to identify a new cause of HSP. They found that this disease is caused by mutations in a gene called PCYT2, which caused the gene to be less active.

The researchers studied the effects of the condition using zebrafish and cell samples from patients with the disease.

They found that zebrafish with normal or reduced PCYT2 activity had significantly better survival rates than those with absent PCYT2 activity, leading Dr Siddharth Banka – Clinical Senior Lecturer at Swag直播 and Consultant Clinical Geneticist at – and his colleagues to conclude that complete loss of PCYT2 activity is likely to be, ’incompatible with life in vertebrates’.

The gene encodes an enzyme which produces a lipid (a fatty molecule) that is used to build cell membranes in every cell of the body. The lipid produced by the enzyme is particularly abundant in brain cell membranes.

A team in Amsterdam was also able to identify abnormal biochemical signatures in the cells and blood of the patients who donated samples. It is hoped that these signatures could be used as markers to help diagnose patients with the condition.

Dr Banka runs a Clinical Genetics clinics at , which is part of MFT. His research group uses a combination of genomics, clinical and functional studies to identify the cause of disease in patient with unsolved genetic conditions.

Dr Banka said: “Saint Mary’s Hospital is one of the leading NHS and internationally recognised large-scale providers of genomic services. Being able to combine my clinical role at the hospital, with my academic research at Swag直播, has been crucial to this outcome.

“This link between academia and the NHS means we can translate research from the bench to the bedside, for the benefit of our patients.

“The identification of more patients in future will help in better understanding of the effects of HSP.”

It is thought that studying this crucial gene will help in understanding other types of HSP and other neurodegenerative diseases.

The paper was published in the neurological journal .

A team from Swag直播 have engineered a common gut bacterium to produce a new class of antibiotics by using robotics. These antibiotics, known as class II polyketides, are also naturally produced by soil bacteria and have antimicrobial properties which are vital in the modern pharmaceutical industry to combat infectious diseases and cancer.

The naturally produced Escherichia coli bacteria are difficult to work with as they grow in dense clumps that are incompatible with the automated robotic systems used for modern biotechnology research. By transferring the production machinery from the soil bacteria into E. coli, the Swag直播 team is now making this class of antibiotics accessible for much more rapid exploration.

This breakthrough could be vital for the ongoing combat against antimicrobial resistance, as recently developed automated robotics systems can now be used to create new antibiotics in a fast and efficient way.

In this work, published in the journal , the group led by Professor Takano at Swag直播 show the potential of this approach. By combining the bacterial production machinery with enzymes from plants and fungi, it was possible to produce new chemical compounds not previously seen in nature. Using this plug-and-play platform, it will now be possible to explore and engineer polyketides using robotic systems to develop new and diversified polyketides in an automated, rapid and versatile fashion.

Eriko Takano, Professor of Synthetic Biology said: “Nature is a huge treasure trove for powerful chemical compounds to treat a wide range of diseases. However, the most interesting chemicals often come from organisms that are difficult to work with in the laboratory.

“This has been a major bottleneck for our work on type II polyketides, a group of important chemicals, which are mostly produced by soil bacteria and other microorganisms that are challenging to grow. By successfully moving the production machinery for these compounds into the “laboratory workhorse” bacterium E. coli, we can finally produce and engineer type II polyketides in our rapid robotic systems.

“This not only allows us to trial new polyketides in an automated manner, but we will also be able to quickly rewrite the DNA sequences of the antibiotic biosynthesis pathways and combine them with new components from other organisms, such as medicinal plants and fungi, to produce variations on the antibiotic theme – including compounds that are not produced by the natural pathways, but may have enhanced or novel activities in the treatment of important diseases.”

It could take a person a whole year to make and test ten new potential antibiotics, but this automated robotic system can make thousands in that time. This would hugely decrease the time it takes for new antibiotics to reach patients, and provide the necessary agility to react to new pathogen strains and outbreaks.

 is one of Swag直播’s  - examples of pioneering discoveries, interdisciplinary collaboration and cross-sector partnerships that are tackling some of the biggest questions facing the planet. #ResearchBeacons

Nearly seventy years after myxomatosis decimated the rabbit populations of Australia, Britain and France, a new study reveals how the species has evolved genetic resistance to the disease through natural selection.

An unprecedented study of rabbit DNA spanning 150 years and thousands of miles has revealed the genetic basis for the animal’s fightback against the deadly myxoma virus. Using the latest technology, an international team which included  Dr Liisa Loog from Swag直播 and led by the University of Cambridge and CIBIO Institute in Porto, extracted DNA from nearly 200 rabbits dating from 1865–2013, including one owned by Charles Darwin. The scientists then sequenced nearly 20,000 genes to pinpoint mutations that have emerged since the myxomatosis pandemics of the 1950s.

The study, published today in the journal Science, establishes that modern rabbits in Australia, the UK and France have acquired resistance to myxomatosis through the same genetic changes. The scientists also discovered that this resistance relies on the cumulative impact of multiple mutations of different genes.

Lead author, Joel Alves said: “We compared rabbits collected before the virus outbreak in the 1950s with modern populations that evolved resistance, and found that the same genes had changed in all three countries. Many of these genes play a key role in the rabbit immune system. Often evolution works through big changes in single genes, but our findings show that resistance to myxomatosis likely evolved through lots of small effects spread across the genome.”

Three particularly significant mutations were discovered in the IFN-alpha 21A gene which sets off a protein-based alarm in rabbit cells when a virus is detected. In the lab, the team produced the form of the protein found in rabbits in the 1950s and the different form found today. Senior author Professor Francis Jiggins from Cambridge’s Department of Genetics said: “We sent these proteins into battle with different strains of the virus and that’s when we saw, on a molecular level, how rabbits have been fighting back over all these years.”

Australia unleashed myxomatosis on an out-of-control rabbit population in 1950. The European rabbit is thought to have been introduced to the country by Thomas Austin, an English settler, in the 1850s. Within a century, they numbered hundreds of millions. The species wreaked havoc on Australia’s native plants and animals but in less than three months, myxomatosis had spread 2,000 km and killed 99 per cent of infected animals. In 1952, the virus was illegally introduced in France and in 1953 it reached the UK, leading to similarly devastating results in both countries.

Scientists soon began tracking the evolution of both the virus and the rabbits, and in all three countries, they observed a substantial drop in fatality rates. They concluded that this was due to the disease becoming less virulent but also rabbits becoming more resistant. Animal populations exhibit considerable genetic variation in susceptibility to infection which allows for rapid evolution of resistance when exposed to new diseases. The pandemics of the 1950s triggered a particularly intense process of natural selection. Those initial findings have become a textbook example of host-parasite coevolution but this new study offers a far more detailed picture of what has been happening in rabbits.

The team collected historical samples from 11 natural history museums in the UK, France, Australia and the United States. One of the rabbits from which DNA was sequenced belonged to Charles Darwin and is now housed in London’s Natural History Museum. Joel Alves said: “It wasn’t easy to get samples from so many long-dead rabbits. Not all natural history museums keep rabbits because they are not very exotic compared to other species. But the museums we worked with have done a great job of keeping their specimens well preserved for decades. This and the availability of new technology gave us a unique opportunity.”

At a time when rabbit populations are collapsing across the UK and mainland Europe, this research may provide clues to the animal’s future. The team found that the protein that helps rabbits fend off the myxoma virus also has an antiviral effect on an unrelated virus called vesicular stomatitis. Miguel Carneiro, from CIBIO, University of Porto, said: “While battling myxoma, rabbits may have increased their resistance to other viruses including, perhaps, rabbit haemorrhagic disease which is killing so many animals right now.”

Meanwhile, myxoma remains a serious threat to rabbits. Joel Alves said: “Viral evolution appears to be finding ways to counter the genetic adaptations which we’ve observed. Recent, more virulent recent strains of myxoma virus, have been found to be extremely immunosuppressive. So the arms race goes on.”

Photos: With thanks to the Trustees of the Natural History Museum

The (NGI) at Swag直播 has signed an 18-month research project with ®, a UK-based manufacturer of portable and reusable water filtration systems.

The 18-month research project will focus on developing technology that can be used for enhanced water filtration, with the goal of creating a proprietary and patented, cutting-edge product capable of eliminating an even wider range of hazardous contaminants than currently removed by its existing high performance ultra-filtration process.

Graphene has emerged as a material with fantastic potential for water filtration and desalination in recent years, with researchers on at the NGI leading the way. Graphene was ever discovered, it is also one of the strongest known natural materials in the world, while retaining high levels of flexibility, conductivity and filtration. By incorporating graphene into its existing market leading water purification technology, LifeSaver hopes to reduce the sieve size of its hollow fiber filtration membrane from the current 15 nanometers (which effectively removes bacteria, microbial cysts and viruses) to about 1-3 nanometers. At that size, LifeSaver products could remove a much wider range of contaminants, such as heavy metals, pesticides, certain chemicals and potentially even nuclear radiation, from drinking water supplies.

“Making a graphene-based portable water filter was our dream, and this collaboration with LifeSaver will enable that dream to be a reality sooner than later,” says , who will lead the project at Swag直播.

“Swag直播 is the world leading centre for graphene membrane development, and LifeSaver has the expertise in making a portable water filter. This is a great example of a collaborative project where we are trying to combine two independently developed technologies into one, to enhance the quality and availability of drinking water for those who need it most.”

“The partnership with NGI excites all of us at LifeSaver as it provides a potential game changing opportunity in our patented technology platform,” says Chris Marsden, Chairman at LifeSaver.

“This in turn allows us to continue to provide leading edge technological solutions to our key global humanitarian and retail markets.”

When LifeSaver approached the NGI in 2017, they were seen as a strong to partner with relevant experience to develop and apply potential graphene applications in water filtration. The team at NGI, which is the UK’s national centre for graphene and two-dimensional materials research, seized the opportunity, and a promising partnership was born.

Founded in the UK in 2007, LifeSaver came to life following back-to-back natural disasters: the Indian Ocean Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina to address the resulting need for access to clean drinking water. The first LifeSaver prototype was developed and became the world’s first portable water filter capable of removing the smallest known waterborne viruses. Since that time, LifeSaver has established itself as an effective and long-lasting solution to drinking water issues in the humanitarian sectors, and outdoor enthusiasts.

Swag直播 is the home of graphene, a material that has captured the imagination of the world. Graphene@Swag直播 is an ongoing program of activity to ensure that Swag直播 and the UK play a leading international role in developing the revolutionary potential of graphene. At the heart of Graphene@Swag直播 is the National Graphene Institute and the Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre (GEIC), multi-million-pound facilities with a commitment to fostering strong industry-academic collaborations.

 is one of Swag直播’s  - examples of pioneering discoveries, interdisciplinary collaboration and cross-sector partnerships that are tackling some of the biggest questions facing the planet. #ResearchBeacons

A major new collaborative project to develop a Zika virus vaccine that is suitable for use in pregnancy has been launched.

Supported by a £4.7million award from Department of Health and Social Care, managed by Innovate UK, the project aims to take two new vaccine candidates through to a clinical trial in humans within the next three years.

It is led by the University of Liverpool, in collaboration with the University of Swag直播, Public Health England and industry, 

Pregnant women continue to be the population at highest risk of a Zika virus infection as the virus can cause severe foetal birth defects. However, no approved vaccine or treatment is currently available.

In collaboration with the University of Swag直播, Public Health England and industry, the researchers plan to confirm the safety of two new vaccine candidates, based on a safe derivative of a pre-existing smallpox vaccine, before moving into Phase 1a first-in-human studies at the Royal Liverpool University Hospital’s Clinical Research Unit.

The team is taking a ‘twin track’ approach to develop a vaccine that produces both antibody and killer T cell responses in order to generate better and longer lasting immunity.

The candidates have been chosen for their safety record, their known beneficial effects when used in combination, and also their potential to be used as vaccines for more than one disease in the future. Importantly, they should also be safe to use during pregnancy.

The research is being led by Professor Neil French and Dr Lance Turtle at the University of Liverpool, Dr Tom Blanchard at Swag直播 and Professor Miles Carrol at Public Health England.

Dr Blanchard said: “Making an effective, affordable and safe vaccine for Zika is a priority.

"I’m delighted to have brought about this collaboration of the Universities of Swag直播 & Liverpool, The Royal Liverpool Hospital and Porton Down to maximise the chances of success”

Professor French, Director of the Centre for Global Vaccine Research at the University of Liverpool and Honorary Consultant in Infectious Diseases at the Royal Liverpool University Hospital said: “Infection research in Liverpool is world leading and we are focused on delivering life changing vaccines and treatments for the most important infectious diseases around the globe.

“Although the current Zika outbreak has slowed, there remains a significant risk of foetal abnormality when pregnant mothers become infected, and the changing climate raises the possibility of major epidemics occurring in previously unaffected parts of the world. A ready to use vaccine would dramatically reduce the threat that we face from Zika.”

Public and Global Health Minister, Steve Brine said: “Britain is a global leader in cutting-edge healthcare research and we should rightly be proud of our scientists and laboratories - this trial has enormous potential to help millions of people.

“Disease transcends lines on a map, so by funding this research we are ensuring British expertise will save and improve lives at home and abroad.”

The work builds upon initial vaccine development research funded through the UK’s Zika Rapid Response Initiative in 2016, which identified the two potential vaccine candidates and immunological studies undertaken at the NIHR Health Protection Research Unit (HPRU) in Emerging and Zoonotic Infections at the University of Liverpool.

The funding for this project is part of a wider programme of Official Development Assistance spending by the Department of Health and Social Care that aims to support the development of vaccines and associated technologies against diseases with epidemic potential. The Zika virus is one of 12 priority pathogens, identified by the UK Vaccine Network, that this programme targets.

A study of over 20 thousand Twitter posts has revealed that less serious side-effects of steroids worry patients the most.

Swag直播 team led by examined different types of side-effects discussed by people using prednisolone, a commonly used steroid drug. They found the two most tweeted symptoms were insomnia and weight gain.

They used a computer system to automatically identify tweets containing the drug name as well as identifying mentions of what looked like a likely drug side-effect. It then converted lay terms like “Can’t sleep” to medical terms such as “insomnia”.

While insomnia and weight gain are well-known side-effects of prednisolone, research has historically focussed on more serious side effects such as osteoporosis and fractures.

Little attention has been given to less serious side-effects – yet this study suggests they worry steroid users more.

With the help of sophisticated computer software, Swag直播 team harvested 159,297 tweets mentioning prednisolone over three years.

Around 20,000 of the tweets also mentioned a suspected side-effect. Of the tweets analysed, 1,737 mentioned insomnia, 1,656 mentioned weight gain, 1,576 mentioned non-specific reactions such as ‘I hate Prednisolone’, and 1,515 reported increased appetite.

The research is published in the journal today.

Team member Dr Rikesh Patel, said: “Though Insomnia and weight gain were the two most commonly discussed side-effects, they are not usually highlighted by clinicians when prescribing prednisolone.

“Part of this is down to a lack of research investigating patient experience with their medications.

“We believe social media such as Twitter can be used to broaden knowledge about drugs and potential side-effects that patients themselves find troublesome.

“And this type of automatic extraction is an efficient way of getting this information, because we’re dealing with large volumes of data.

Professor Dixon added: “Our view is that social media sources such as Twitter can be useful because they can illustrate which drug side-effects patients discuss most commonly, even if they are not necessarily the most serious.

“Less serious side-effects are often missed in other research because patients may not mention their symptoms to their doctors, or they are not recorded in medical records. Yet this is despite them being troublesome.

“This form of research is clearly just one piece of the jigsaw, but it nevertheless is an important one.

“In this example, it helps re-focus our research into steroid-related side effects that are clearly important to patients.

“Social media posts may also give us a future view of how side effects impact on patients’ quality of life.”

A team at Swag直播 have found that in a minority of patients they studied, the standard treatment for asthma - oral steroids - was associated with increased levels of the treatable mould Aspergillus in the lung.

The findings could be of valuable help to asthmatics who endure severe and difficult to treat symptoms, by giving doctors the information they need to plan their care more effectively.

The team stress there is no danger to asthmatics from steroid therapy and that patients should continue taking their steroid inhalers or tablets as prescribed.

About 40% of people with severe asthma have allergies to Aspergillus in their lungs.

The research showed that severe asthmatics with allergies were ten times more likely to carry higher levels of mould when on corticosteroid treatment.

Individuals in the study receiving antifungal therapy had lower quantities of the mould in the lung; the fungal load was much higher if the therapy had been stopped.

“Aspergillus infection is usually treatable, but might be able to explain why some asthmatic patients are having persistent symptoms on steroids,” said Dr Paul Bowyer, senior author on the study from Swag直播.

“We stress there is no danger to any individuals taking steroids to alleviate their asthma.

“But nevertheless this data is important because it may help doctors to consider additional treatments to individuals with allergies to this mould associated with steroids, so they may be helped more effectively.”

Dr Bowyer and Dr Livingstone Chisimba, also from Swag直播 and colleagues from Swag直播 University NHS Foundation Trust examined the airways of 48 people with mild to severe asthma, and 10 volunteers with no symptoms.

Dr Chisimba said: “With higher Aspergillus loads seen in those on oral steroids, we believe these data combined with genetic or other biological markers of asthma will uncover a fundamental understanding of the role of the fungal infections in asthma.

“This is a telling finding.”

Though different fungi were found with variation between individuals, the most common was Aspergillus.

Multiple different isolated spores of the mould were detected in the same lung, possibly, say the team, because excess mucus - a characteristic feature of asthma - acts as an efficient spore trap.

That, they explain, allows the spores from inhaled air to accumulate . Excess mucus is able to protect Aspergillus from the body’s normal defences, they say.

The research is published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

The paper Corticosteroid treatment is associated with increased filamentous fungal burden in airways, published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology is available

Funding from the NIHR Swag直播 Biomedical Research Centre to optimise the treatment of common respiratory and fungal diseases will further build on this research.

Scientists at Swag直播 have discovered that most people with osteoarthritis can be subdivided into two distinct disease groups, with implications for diagnosis and drug development.

based at The University’s and says the team has identified two different patterns of disease activity.

The research, funded by , is published in the international journal,

The discovery of the two disease groups was made by using mathematical analysis of the thousands of genes expressed from tissue obtained from 60 individual patients with knee osteoarthritis.

As the stratification is based on active metabolism in the diseased tissue, the team believe it may help predict different patient responses to treatment.

Osteoarthritis is a complex and debilitating disease which affects more than 8 million sufferers in UK, which is increasing as the population ages.

Professor Hardingham said: “This is an important new discovery in Osteoarthritis, which reveals a metabolic basis for developing patient specific treatments targeted at the two different groups

“It will inform the future design, set up and analysis of drug trials and may help predict different patient responses to treatment.

“There is an urgent need for better treatments and we hope this research may help us along that road.

“Musculo-skeletal conditions cost the NHS £4.76 billion per year in 2013-14 and there has been little advance in the treatments for osteoarthritis over that past 30 years; new approaches tested have yielded little benefit.”

The team also developed a more simple method of analysis, generating a list of candidate biomarkers for detection in patients’ synovial fluid - found in the cavities of joints - to distinguish patients in the two Groups

They hope the analysis will help future research.

He added: “This is a significant step forward in our understanding of osteoarthritis, a complex and debilitating disease which has a major socio-economic impact.

“However, the discovery is just the first step in a long process that may lead to developing new drugs and treatments that are targeted to each group.”

“The disease has many clinical criteria and treating it as a single disease has become recognised as unproductive.

“So any new treatments which delayed the onset, or reduced progression of osteoarthritis in either group, would relieve much patient suffering and reduce the healthcare burden.”

Dr Natalie Carter, head of research liaison and evaluation at Arthritis Research UK, comments:

“We know that millions of people live with the daily pain of osteoarthritis. This, coupled with stiffness and fatigue, can make everyday life difficult, limiting a person’s ability to get dressed, go to work or even climb the stairs.

Although it’s still very early days, this study is good news for people with osteoarthritis and helps us to build on our understanding of the condition. We welcome more research, like this study, that has the potential to improve the way we understand, diagnose and treat osteoarthritis and so that people with arthritis can live the pain free life they deserve.”

” is published online in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

Community screening for osteoporosis could prevent more than a quarter of hip fractures in older women – according to new research.

The study published in The Lancet reveals that a simple questionnaire, combined with bone mineral density measurements for some, would help identify those at risk of hip fracture.

Led by the University of East Anglia (UEA),  Professor Terence O’Neill was principal investigator for the research study at Swag直播

The research, which involved more than 12,000 older women, found that screening through GP practices allowed patients to be targeted for treatment.

In women agreeing to participate, this led to a 28 per cent reduction in hip fractures over five years.

Lead researcher Prof Lee Shepstone, from UEA’s Norwich Medical School, said: “Approximately one in three women and one in five men aged over 50 year will suffer a fragility fracture during their remaining lifetime. In the UK around 536,000 people suffer fragility fractures each year, including 79,000 hip fractures.

“A hip fracture can be devastating with a loss of independence and less than one third of patients make a full recovery. Mortality at one-year post-fracture is approximately 20 per cent.”

“We wanted to find out whether screening, like screening for breast cancer, could help identify those at risk of suffering a fracture.”

The large multicentre UK-based community screening study was a collaboration primarily between UEA and the University of Sheffield, and involved researchers at the Universities of Southampton, Bristol, Birmingham, Swag直播 and York, and over 100 primary care practices.

The team used a University of Sheffield developed tool called FRAX, which predicts the probability of a hip fracture or a major osteoporotic fracture (a hip, spine, upper arm or lower arm fracture), to identify older women at high risk.

A total of 12,483 women aged 70-85 were recruited from 100 GP practices in seven regions (Birmingham, Bristol, Swag直播, Norwich, Sheffield, Southampton, and York).

Half of the women were screened to compare screening with routine care.

Among those screened, treatment was subsequently recommended for one in seven women deemed at high risk of hip fracture. This recommendation was acted upon by the women and their GPs so that over three quarters of the women at high risk were on osteoporosis medications within six months of screening.

While screening did not reduce the incidence of all osteoporosis-related fractures, there was strong evidence for a reduction in hip fractures.

In the screening group, there were 54 fewer women who suffered one or more hip fractures compared to the routine care group.

The study suggests that one hip fracture could be prevented for every 111 women screened and early analysis suggests the approach is likely to be cost-effective.

Professor Terence O’Neill from Swag直播 said: “the results of this trial, which included over one thousand women aged 70 to 85 years recruited to the Swag直播 centre, are important and suggest that community screening using an established fracture risk assessment tool may help reduce the risk of hip fractures.”

Prof Shepstone said: “This is the first trial to show that a community-screening approach based on the FRAX fracture risk tool is both feasible and effective. Given that the number of costly and debilitating hip fractures are expected to increase with an ageing population, the results of this study potentially have important public health implications.”

Prof Eugene McCloskey, University of Sheffield, said: “Low-cost screening with FRAX among the older population could result in effective, targeted intervention to reduce the human and socioeconomic burden of hip fractures. If the SCOOP screening strategy was taken up in exactly the same way as in the study in all UK women aged 70-85 years, we estimate that the strategy could prevent up to 8000 hip fractures per year in the UK. Even greater gains could be made if we could reach out to women similar to those who did not take part in the study.”

The randomised controlled trial ‘SCreening for Osteoporosis in Older women for the Prevention of fracture’ (SCOOP) was funded by the Medical Research Council and

Arthritis Research UK.

Dr Natalie Carter, head of research liaison and evaluation at Arthritis Research UK, said:

“Ten of thousands of people a year present with hip fractures in the UK. As well as significantly increasing mortality, a hip fracture can stop a person’s ability to live independently, with 43% no longer being able to walk independently in the year after the fracture.

We welcome this community based screening programme and any other research that reduces the likelihood of fractures.”

‘Screening in the community to reduce fractures in older women (SCOOP): a randomised controlled trial’ is published in The Lancet on December 15.

Prof Shepstone said: “This is the first trial to show that a community-screening approach based on the FRAX fracture risk tool is both feasible and effective. Given that the number of costly and debilitating hip fractures are expected to increase with an ageing population, the results of this study potentially have important public health implications.”

Prof Eugene McCloskey, University of Sheffield, said: “Low-cost screening with FRAX among the older population could result in effective, targeted intervention to reduce the human and socioeconomic burden of hip fractures. If the SCOOP screening strategy was taken up in exactly the same way as in the study in all UK women aged 70-85 years, we estimate that the strategy could prevent up to 8000 hip fractures per year in the UK. Even greater gains could be made if we could reach out to women similar to those who did not take part in the study.”

The randomised controlled trial ‘SCreening for Osteoporosis in Older women for the Prevention of fracture’ (SCOOP) was funded by the Medical Research Council and

Arthritis Research UK.

Dr Natalie Carter, head of research liaison and evaluation at Arthritis Research UK, said:

“Ten of thousands of people a year present with hip fractures in the UK. As well as significantly increasing mortality, a hip fracture can stop a person’s ability to live independently, with 43% no longer being able to walk independently in the year after the fracture.

We welcome this community based screening programme and any other research that reduces the likelihood of fractures.”

is published in The Lancet

A team of researchers from the and University of Swag直播 have uncovered new insights into a rare genetic disease, with less than 500 cases of the disease on record, which devastates the lives of children.

Chediak-Higashi syndrome (CHS) is a complex disease, exhibiting very diversified symptoms, including predisposition to bleeding, a wide range of neurological issues, and dysregulated immune responses so that they are unable to fight infections which would normally be easily dealt with.

Unfortunately, in the majority of cases, people with CHS develop a severe and fatal hyperinflammatory condition. One feature of CHS patient’s is that a population of white blood cells, known as Natural Killer (NK) cells are unable to function properly.

Normally, ‘NK cells’ recognize and kill aberrant cells, like cancer cells or virus-infected cells, by secreting bags of toxic enzymes, called lytic granules, into the diseased cells. However, this does not happen in the case of CHS; people with CHS have larger-than-usual bags of these enzymes which then cannot exit the immune cell properly.

The team – which includes from Swag直播 – found that the defects in in CHS immune cells are related to a mechanical barrier, the cell’s cytoskeleton, which seems to prevent the immune cells’ ability to kill diseased cells.

In order to uncover the underlying cause for the defective function of NK cells in CHS, they generated a human cell line model of the disease, using modern gene editing techniques.

With the model and super-resolution microscopy, they demonstrated that CHS NK cells have the ability to respond normally to different stimuli, but can’t secrete their lytic granules, because they are simply too big to pass through the barrier of the cell’s cytoskeleton.

Professor Davis said: “My research team and I have been using microscopes to watch how immune cells kill diseased cells for many years. From what we and others have learnt, we can now see how medicines might be able aid the process. Working with researchers at the NIH, we found that the activity of CHS NK cells could be partially restored with drugs that open up an internal barrier in cells, the cell’s cytoskeleton.

“The problem was that the meshwork of actin protein that underlines the cell membrane is too dense to allow these giant lytic granules out of the cell, resulting in defective CHS NK cell function.

“Importantly, we found that decreasing the actin density, or the size of lytic granules, restores the ability of CHS NK cells to kill target cells.

“Thus, restoration of white blood cell function in CHS could be possible, and a major factor limiting the release of enlarged lytic granules could be a novel target for drug development.”

Davis added: “Our findings provide a new and important insight into pathology of this rare genetic disease.

“Broader than this, this is one example of how immunologists are beginning to harness the power of the immune system to tackle all sorts of diseases, from cancer to autoimmune disease.

“Restoring the function of white blood cells in CHS might have an important impact for the patients’ welfare, as it could extend the period of time CHS patients can wait for a bone marrow transplant that is now the only way to prevent the development of a fatal hyperinflammatory condition that occurs in many people with CHS.”

The researchers’ findings suggest the potential to negate this problem and restore proper immune cell function. The research is published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

Professor Davis is author of popular level books about the immune system, ‘The Compatibility Gene’ and the forthcoming ‘The Beautiful Cure’.

He is Director for Research at the University’s , which also announces today £2m of investment from GlaxoSmithKline.

The MCCIR, established in 2012, is unique collaboration which has established a world-leading translational centre for inflammatory diseases. It employs 86 scientists and a cumulative grant research budget of £43M.

The cash will fund 11 additional projects in PhD and postdoctoral level in the areas COPD, kidney injury, asthma, IBD, complement function and super-resolution microscopy

Professor Tracy Hussell, Director, MCCIR said: “Industry has a pivotal role to play in discovery science and it is crucial that we share early stage research ideas and tools to enable us to tackle new ideas and approaches that could benefit all.

“This reinvestment by GSK is an endorsement of that philosophy and since our collaboration, we have won a significant amount of competitive peer reviewed funding.”

Malcolm Skingle, Director of Academic Liaison, GSK said: “Collaboration with academic researchers is vital to progress scientific understanding and enable development of innovative new medicines.

“We are delighted to continue to support UK based research efforts through our continued collaboration with the MCCIR academic scientists’.”

The paper An actin cytoskeletal barrier inhibits lytic granule release from Natural Killer cells in Chediak-Higashi syndrome is published in the

An international team of scientists have confirmed the discovery of a major cause of dementia, with important implications for possible treatment and diagnosis.

from Swag直播, who leads the Swag直播 team, says the build-up of urea in the brain to toxic levels can cause brain damage – and eventually dementia.

The work follows on from Professor Cooper’s earlier studies, which identified metabolic linkages between Huntington’s, other neurodegenerative diseases and type-2 diabetes.

The team consists of scientists from Swag直播, the University of Auckland, AgResearch New Zealand, the South Australian Research and Development Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard University.

The latest paper by the scientists, published today in the , shows that Huntington’s Disease - one of seven major types of age-related dementia - is directly linked to brain urea levels and metabolic processes.

Their 2016 study revealing that urea is similarly linked to Alzheimer’s, shows, according to Professor Cooper, that the discovery could be relevant to all types of age-related dementias.

The Huntington’s study also showed that the high urea levels occurred before dementia sets in, which could help doctors to one day diagnose and even treat dementia, well in advance of its onset.

Urea and ammonia in the brain are metabolic breakdown products of protein. Urea is more commonly known as a compound which is excreted from the body in urine. If urea and ammonia build up in the body because the kidneys are unable to eliminate them, for example, serious symptoms can result.

Professor Cooper, who is based at Swag直播’s , said: “This study on Huntington’s Disease is the final piece of the jigsaw which leads us to conclude that high brain urea plays a pivotal role in dementia.

“Alzheimer’s and Huntington’s are at opposite ends of the dementia spectrum – so if this holds true for these types, then I believe it is highly likely it will hold true for all the major age-related dementias.

“More research, however, is needed to discover the source of the elevated urea in HD, particularly concerning the potential involvement of ammonia and a systemic metabolic defect.

“This could have profound implications for our fundamental understanding of the molecular basis of dementia, and its treatability, including the potential use of therapies already in use for disorders with systemic urea phenotypes.”

Dementia results in a progressive and irreversible loss of nerve cells and brain functioning, causing loss of memory and cognitive impairments affecting the ability to learn. Currently, there is no cure.

The team used human brains, donated by families for medical research, as well as transgenic sheep in Australia.

Swag直播 members of the team used cutting-edge gas chromatography mass spectrometry to measure brain urea levels. For levels to be toxic urea must rise 4-fold or higher than in the normal brain says Professor Cooper.

He added: “We already know Huntington’s Disease is an illness caused by a faulty gene in our DNA - but until now we didn’t understand how that causes brain damage – so we feel this is an important milestone.

“Doctors already use medicines to tackle high levels of ammonia in other parts of the body Lactulose - a commonly used laxative, for example, traps ammonia in the gut. So it is conceivable that one day, a commonly used drug may be able to stop dementia from progressing. It might even be shown that treating this metabolic state in the brain may help in the regeneration of tissue, thus giving a tantalising hint that reversal of dementia may one day be possible.”

Professor Cooper expresses his thanks to all the families of patients with Huntington's disease in New Zealand who so generously supported this research through the donation of brain tissue to the Neurological Foundation of New Zealand Douglas Human Brain Bank in the Centre for Brain Research.

This work was supported by the CHDI Foundation (A-8247) and Brain Research New Zealand.

The paper ‘Brain urea increase is an early Huntington’s disease pathogenic event observed in a prodromal transgenic sheep model and HD cases’ is available on request

Other Swag直播-based scientists who made important contributions are Dr Stefano Patassini and Dr Jingshu Xu.

Relevant papers include:

• . Biochimica et Biophysica Acta (2016)
• . Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications (2015)
• . Biochimica et Biophysica Acta (2016)
• . Scientific Reports (2016)
• . Metallomics. (2017)
• . Journal of Huntington’s Disease (2013)
• . Proteomics (2001)

Anyone with queries about Alzheimers should contact The Alzheimer’s Research Society on 0300 111 5555 or visit 

Anyone with queries about Huntington’s Disease should contact The Huntington’s Disease Association on 0151 331 5444 or visit 

An international team of scientists and doctors has identified a new disease that results in low levels of a common protein found inside our cells.

The study, led by from Swag直播 and the Swag直播 Centre for Genomic Medicine, St Mary's Hospital, is published in the reputed

β-actin is the cell’s most abundant protein, providing shape and allowing them to move. It is fundamental to a number of biological functions.

The team say the new disease is caused by gene mutations which result in half of the normal β-actin levels.

Dr Sara Cuvertino, a Research Associate at Swag直播 and first author of the paper, said: “β-actin is so vital to our cells that it was very surprising for me that patients could still survive on just half the normal levels of this critical protein”.

Dr Banka said, “Although patients born with these mutations have developmental delay, heart and kidney abnormalities, it is remarkable that several are leading a reasonably healthy life.

“Some affected individuals also have neurological problems such as epilepsy.”

Dr Cuvertino studied the cells of patients affected with this new disease and found several subtle defects such as unusual shape, reduced capacity to move and divide.

“The β-actin of a worm is very similar to the human protein. This remarkable conservation across millions of years of evolution reflects the importance of this protein for life,” said Dr Cuvertino.

Dr Banka added “In our study we have described 33 patients, which is a large number for a first paper on a rare genetic disease. I am sure that this discovery will lead to identification of more patients from across the world, who have not yet been diagnosed.”

Dr Cuvertino said, “Our studies of patient cells have provided some very interesting clues to the underlying mechanism of the disease that may provide a foundation for developing treatments”.

Dr Banka’s group is now studying how reduction in β-actin causes the disease with a goal to develop possible treatments for these patients.

The doctors and scientists is unable to deal; with individual enquires from the public. However, patients should in the first instance contact their GP who may refer them on to a local geneticist.

Journalist who wish to see a copy of the journal article should contact the American journal of human genetics directly on jcaputo@cell.com or press@cell.com

Scientists at the CRUK Swag直播 Institute, based at Swag直播, have discovered that testing skin cancer patients’ blood for tumour DNA could help predict the chances of an aggressive cancer returning.

Published in the Annals of Oncology today (Wednesday), the findings could pave the way to identifying patients who are most at risk of their disease returning, and who might benefit from new immunotherapy treatments.

Led by researchers based at the Cancer Research UK Swag直播 Institute and The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, scientists studied blood samples taken after surgery from 161 patients with stage 2 and 3 melanoma. They then looked for faults in two genes that are linked to 70% of melanoma skin cancers – BRAF and NRAS.

After five years, 33% of patients who had a positive blood test for faults in either of the two genes were alive, compared to 65% of those who did not.

The results also revealed that skin cancer was much more likely to return within a year of surgery in patients who had faults in either of the two genes.

Each year around 15,400 people in the UK are diagnosed with malignant melanoma. And while survival has doubled in the last 40 years, around 2,500 people die from the disease every year in the UK.

Professor Richard Marais, lead researcher and director of the Cancer Research UK Swag直播 Institute, based at the University of Swag直播, said: “For some patients with advanced melanoma, their cancer will eventually return. We have no accurate tests to predict who these patients will be, so our findings are really encouraging. If we can use this tumour DNA test to accurately predict if cancer is going to come back, then it could help doctors decide which patients could benefit from new immunotherapies. These treatments can then reduce the risk of the cancer spreading. The next step is to run a trial where patients have regular blood tests after their initial treatment has finished in order to test this approach.”

Professor Karen Vousden, Cancer Research UK’s chief scientist, said: “Being able to develop an early warning system that will predict if a cancer will return could make a real difference to patients. Research like this shows that for some cancers, there may be ingenious solutions - such as a blood test. If follow up research shows that this test can be used to inform treatment decisions and improve outlook, it could be a game-changer in our ability to deal with advanced skin cancer.”

Scientists at Swag直播 have identified some key factors that establish oesophageal cancer cells. 

and his clinical collaborator Dr Yeng Ang led a team which used a new approach, looking for molecular signatures within the human genome which act as markers for cancer cells.

The signatures are able to define how the genes in oesophagus cancer are controlled and how this differs from normal oesophageal cells.

By using the information they identified which proteins are activated to drive oesophageal cancer.

The study is published in PLOS Genetics and was funded through a Swag直播 Cancer Research Centre (MCRC) clinical training fellowship to the lead author, Ed Britton, from Cancer Research UK.

And thanks to the work, the scene is set for a new branch of research which may be able to develop leads for generating targeted drug therapies.

Professor Sharrocks said: “Oesophageal adenocarcinoma, a type of oesophageal cancer, has an abysmal survival rate, partly because it is poorly understood at the molecular level. Few, if any,  targeted therapies exist.

“It presents late and patients have to endure a brutal chemotherapy treatment regime.

“There has been little progress in understanding this cancer over many years, so we believe this approach might represent a major step forward.”

Professor Sharrocks used a revolutionary technique called ATAC-seq which has the potential to reveal molecular changes in individual cancer cells. Previously, scientists were only able to analysis millions of cells at a time.

Current approaches focus on identifying changes to the DNA code in oesophageal cancer cells. However, the DNA is tightly packed into the nucleus meaning that it is “insulated” from being activated.

The new technique looks at a novel aspect of changes that occur in cancer cells and interrogates the packaging itself. That allows identification of regions where DNA is exposed and hence potentially in an “active” form.

Professor Sharrocks added: “We have validated these results among other data sets by cross checking them and they confirm our findings.

“But most importantly,  our research has been driven by data and not by inclination. Before the advent of approaches like ATAC-seq, scientists were forced to be selective in what they analysed. Now it is wholly more scientific.”

Dr Catherine Pickworth, science information officer at Cancer Research UK, said: "By identifying two important molecules involved in the development of oesophageal cancer, this study uncovers potential new drug targets for one of the hardest cancers to treat. The next steps will be to find out if drugs can be developed to target these molecules, and if they can be used to treat people with the disease. Survival for oesophageal cancer remains stubbornly low and research like this that tells us more about how it develops is vital to building a full picture of the disease."

Bacteria may be responsible for more than we suspect. Especially when it comes to inflammatory diseases such as Type 2 diabetes.

from Stellenbosch University (SU) in South Africa and from Swag直播 have conducted a series of studies that are drastically changing the way scientists think about the effect bacteria have on a number of diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, Sepsis, Rheumatoid Arthritis, and most recently Type 2 diabetes (T2D).

Previously, Pretorius and Kell have established that these chronic inflammatory diseases also have a microbial origin. “If the bacteria were active, or replicating, as in the case of infectious diseases, we would have known all about that,” says Kell. “But the microbes are not replicating, they’re mainly actually dormant.”

Because their dormant nature meant that they did not manifest under standard microbial test conditions, bacteria were previously thought to be absent from human blood, consistent with the view that blood is ‘sterile’. However, high levels of iron in blood (typical of inflammatory diseases) can effectively bring these bacteria back to life. suggested that under these conditions, the bacteria start replicating and secreting lipopolysaccharides (LPS), leading to increased inflammation.

The one thing these chronic diseases have in common is constantly elevated levels of inflammation. Pretorius and Kell had already established that anomalous amyloidogenic blood clotting, a cause of inflammation, is linked to and can be experimentally induced by bacterial cell wall constituents such as LPS and Lipoteichoic acid (LTA). These are cell wall components of Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria, respectively. Read more at on this topic.

These coagulopathies (adverse blood clotting) are also typical of inflammatory diseases and the researchers have long shown that they lead to amyloid formation, where the blood clotting proteins (called fibrinogen) are structurally deformed from a-helixes to a flat b-sheet-like structures, potentially leading to cell death and neuro-degeneration.

As a result, the fibrin fibres of blood clots in diseased individuals are distinctly different from those of healthy individuals. This can be visualised microscopically and is discussed in various publications from the group. “In normal blood clots, these fibres would look like a bowl of spaghetti” explains Pretorius. “But in diseased individuals, their blood clots look matted with large fused and condensed fibres. They can also be observed with special stains that fluoresce in the presence of amyloid.”

The researchers found that this changed clot structure is present in all inflammatory conditions studied, now including Type 2 diabetes. But what is the link between this abnormal clot formation, bacteria, LPS and TLA? And are there any molecules that may “mop up” LPS or LTA and that might be circulating in the blood of people with inflammatory diseases?

In their , recently published in  (a Nature publication), Pretorius and Kell, along with MSc student Ms Sthembile Mbotwe from the University of Pretoria, investigated the effect of LPS-binding protein (LBP), which is normally produced by all individuals. They added LBP to blood from T2D patients (and also to healthy blood after the addition of LPS). Previously they had showed that LPS causes abnormal clot formation when added to healthy blood, and that this could be reversed by LBP. In this publication they showed that LBP could also reverse the adverse clot structure in T2D blood. This process was confirmed by both scanning electron microscopy and super-resolution confocal microscopy. The conclusion is clear: bacterial LPS is a significant player in the development and maintenance of T2D and its disabling sequelae.

“In an inflamed situation, large amounts of LPS probably prevent LBP from doing its work properly,” explains Pretorius.

So what does this mean in terms of treatment?

“We now have a considerable amount of evidence, much of it new, that in contrast to the current strategies for attacking T2D, the recognition that it involves dormant microbes, chronic inflammatory processes and coagulopathies, offer new opportunities for treatment,” the researchers conclude.

New research has discovered a way to stop a deadly fungus from ‘hijacking’ the body’s immune system and spreading to the brain.

The study was led by the University of Birmingham in collaboration with the Universities of Swag直播, Sheffield and Dundee, as well as the University of Leuven in Belgium and Harvard Medical School in the US, were published today in  

The team studied Cryptococcosis, a disease that infects humans and animals after breathing in airborne fungi.  The disease can result in a lung infection that may subsequently spread to the brain by hitching a lift inside our own white blood cells.

Professor Robin May, Director of the Institute of Microbiology & Infection at the University of Birmingham, said: “When an infection starts, the first white blood cell to respond is called a macrophage. This identifies the invading bacteria or fungus, ‘eats it’, destroys it and then alerts the rest of the immune system.

“However, in the case of some diseases like Cryptococcosis, the invading organism has evolved to be able to survive inside that white blood cell and then use them like a public transport system to help move around the body. 

 “We know that many white blood cells overcome this by throwing those hijackers out, using a mechanism called ‘vomocytosis’. However, we don’t know how vomocytosis is controlled.

“There are many diseases, not only Cryptococcosis, in which pathogens - bacteria, viruses, fungi or parasites that can cause disease - survive by deliberately hijacking the immune system in this way.

“This research aimed to identify the mechanism that allows white blood cells to recognise and expel these hijackers.

“If we can develop ways to manipulate this and encourage the white blood cells to recognise and expel organisms like this, we might be able to limit the spread of infection not only for Cryptococcosis but for other invasive pathogens that are a significant threat to human health world-wide.”

They identified signals that white blood cells use to control their behaviour, then one by one disabled those signals - discovering that one particular molecule called ERK5 could be manipulated to encourage white blood cells either to throw out pathogens better or to keep them inside and try to kill them for longer.

Professor May continues: “We found that by blocking ERK5 in zebrafish, we were able to increase vomocytosis rates in their white blood cells and so prevent a deadly fungal infection from spreading to the brain.

“As a consequence of this research we have a greater understanding of a really subtle and new aspect of the human immune system.

“Longer term, our hope is that we will be able to develop therapies that target this process, such as drugs that would be able to limit an infection and prevent it from spreading from the initial site of attack.

“We would also now like to broaden this research to see how much this process may play a similar role in other major human diseases.”

The human whipworm, which infects 500 million people and can damage physical and mental growth, is killed at egg and adult stage by a new drug class developed at the Universities of Swag直播 and Oxford and University College London.

Current treatments for human whipworm are based on 1960s drugs initially developed for livestock and have a low success rate in people. There are also no vaccines available.

As a result there’s a desperate need for new treatments. The team from the three UK universities, whose results have been published in the journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases, studied a class of dihydrobenzoxazepinones, not previously associated with controlling whipworms.

The researchers found that the compounds kill the adult stages of the whipworm much more effectively than existing drugs.

Parasite immunologist, from Swag直播 said: “Eradicating the whipworm requires more effective drugs, improving hygiene and vaccine development. The compounds we have discovered could address the first two of these.”

Whipworm eggs are also affected by the compounds. Whipworm eggs are passed from infected faeces into people by hand to mouth contact. This often happens in unsanitary toilets or areas where people live close together. The eggs are highly resistant to extreme temperature changes and ultraviolet radiation and can remain viable in the environment for many years.

However the new compounds are effective against the eggs and could be developed into a spray which can stop infection at source.

The researchers are now modifying their compounds to make them effective enough for a treatment in humans, and one that can be turned into a product used in the developing countries most affected.

Professor Else said: “This team brought expertise from immunology, medicinal chemistry and neurobiology and really shows how combining across disciplines and institutions can lead to important new discoveries.

“Although we rarely see whipworm infection in the UK, it is a serious and damaging problem in many parts of the world and if we can develop this treatment, the lives of many people could be improved.”

The paper, ‘’, was published in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0005359

Funding was provided by .

is one of Swag直播’s - examples of pioneering discoveries, interdisciplinary collaboration and cross-sector partnerships that are tackling some of the biggest questions facing the planet. #ResearchBeacons

A team of American and British scientists have for the first time discovered genetic connections between sleep disturbance and a range of medical disorders including obesity.

Lead author Dr Jacqueline Lane, postdoctoral fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and joint senior authors Richa Saxena, Assistant Professor of Anaesthesia at the MGH and Harvard Medical School and Dr Martin K Rutter, Senior Lecturer in Cardiometabolic Medicine from Swag直播, publish their ground-breaking research in Nature Genetics today.

The study looked at the biological controllers of sleep duration, insomnia and excessive daytime sleepiness, and how they linked to the health and life histories of more than 112,000 people taking part in the world-leading UK Biobank study.

Study participants reported their sleep duration, the degree of insomnia and daytime sleepiness, and then had their genes mapped. Other information about them such as their weight and any diseases they suffered from was also collected.

The researchers identified for the first time areas of the genome that are associated with sleep disturbance including insomnia and excessive daytime sleepiness and also discovered novel genetic links with several medical conditions including restless legs syndrome, schizophrenia and obesity.

The strongest genetic association for insomnia symptoms fell within a gene previously linked to restless legs syndrome – a nervous system disorder affecting around 1 in 20 people that leads to a strong urge to move one's legs which is often worse at night. Other gene regions were important for insomnia but selectively in either men or women.

The team also identified genetic links between longer sleep duration and schizophrenia risk and between increased levels of excessive daytime sleepiness and measures of obesity (body mass index and waist circumference).

The research also suggested that insomnia has shared underlying biology with major depression and abnormal glucose metabolism.

Funded by the US National Institutes of Health and Swag直播’s Research Innovation Fund, the study marks a major advance in our understanding of the biology of sleep.

One in four British adults are obese, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, prompting fears that the UK has become the "fat man of Europe". And at any one time about 280,000 people are being treated for schizophrenia by the NHS. Sufferers have a 1 in 10 chance of dying by their own hand within ten years of diagnosis.

Dr Rutter said: “This clinical science is an important step forwards in understanding the biological basis for these conditions so it’s very exciting.”

“Scientists have long observed a connection between sleep disorders and these conditions in epidemiological studies. But this is the first time these biological links have been identified at a molecular level.”

UK Biobank aims to improving the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of a wide range of serious and life-threatening illnesses.

Dr Lane said, ”We’re particularly pleased to be able to use UK Biobank data in this way; it’s an amazing resource for scientists.”

Dr Saxena said: “It’s important to remember there is no molecular targeting available for conditions which affect sleep: all we really have are sedatives.”

“So we hope that this research will enable scientists to develop new ways to intervene on a range of conditions in a much more fundamental way.”

“We do acknowledge these findings will need further study, but believe this knowledge amounts to a key advance in our understanding of the biology behind sleep - a major influence on our health and behaviour.”

Swag直播, a member of the prestigious Russell Group of British universities, is the largest and most popular university in the U.K. It has 20 academic schools and hundreds of specialist research groups undertaking pioneering multi-disciplinary teaching and research of worldwide significance including a major programme of work in biological timing. Swag直播 is one of the country’s major research institutions, rated fifth in the U.K. in terms of ‘research power’ (REF 2014), and has had no fewer than 25 Nobel laureates either work or study there. The University had an annual income of £886 million in 2013-14.

Massachusetts General Hospital, founded in 1811, is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. The  conducts the largest hospital-based research program in the nation, with an annual research budget of more than $800 million and major research centers in HIV/AIDS, cardiovascular research, cancer, computational and integrative biology, cutaneous biology, human genetics, medical imaging, neurodegenerative disorders, regenerative medicine, reproductive biology, systems biology, photomedicine and transplantation biology. The MGH topped the 2015 Nature Index list of health care organizations publishing in leading scientific journals and earned the prestigious 2015 Foster G. McGaw Prize for Excellence in Community Service. In August 2016 the MGH was once again named to the Honor Roll in the U.S. News & World Report list of "America’s Best Hospitals."

Current approaches to dealing with burnouts in doctors on an individual case-by-case basis is not effective and the issue should instead be tackled with organisation-wide initiatives, according to researchers at Swag直播 and the University of Southampton.

A meta-analysis study, which brought together the results of previously conducted research, was carried out to explore the effectiveness of interventions in reducing burnout in doctors. It explored the comparison between doctor-directed interventions that target the individual and organisation-directed interventions that target the working environment. The strength of the doctor’s experience and the particular healthcare setting they worked in was also assessed.

The research concluded that while doctor-focused tactics such as mindfulness and cognitive behavioural are important, the greatest success at preventing and reducing burnout in doctors can be achieved through the adoption of organisation-directed approaches such as improved working environment and organisational culture.

Burnout is a major problem in the healthcare industry and is often driven by excessive workload, imbalance between job demands and skills, a lack of job control and prolonged stress. It is a syndrome consisting of emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation, and a diminished sense of personal accomplishment. Importantly, burnout can result in an increase in medical errors, reduced quality of patient care, and lower patient satisfaction.

It was found that organisations that combined several elements such as structural changes, fostering communications between members of the health care team, and cultivating a sense of teamwork and job control tended to be the most effective in reducing burnout. However, such intense organisation-directed interventions were rare and had not been evaluated sufficiently.

What’s more, the evidence indicated that young doctors starting out in their career, are at higher risk of burnout compared to those with more experience, and interventions focused on enhancing teamwork, mentoring, and leadership skills might be particularly suitable for this group.

Dr Maria Panagioti, Research fellow in Primary Care at the University of Swag直播 who led this study said: ‘Our findings clearly show that we need more effective intervention models to prevent burnout in doctors. Such models could be organization-directed interventions which promote healthy individual-organization relationships and view burnout a problem of the whole healthcare systems.’

George Lewith, Professor of Health Research at the University of Southampton who supervised the research, said: “This work suggests that if we want to retain safe and professionally competent NHS clinicians working in very demanding front line jobs we need to support their mental and physical health and creating appropriate and enabling working environments for them. Efforts need to be focused on finding appropriate ways of reaching doctors who work in stressful environments to ensure their wellbeing is taken care of. If we don’t patient safety could be at risk.”

The work is published in the JAMA Internal Medicine. To obtain a copy, please email Deanna Bellandi, Senior Public Information Officer Deanna.Bellandi@jamanetwork.org

A highly successful University scheme to train “high flyers” who are likely to become future leaders in academia and industry has been renewed by the Medical Research Council (MRC).

The North West England MRC Clinical Research Training Fellowship Programme in Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics is an initiative funded by the MRC and run jointly by the Universities of Liverpool and Swag直播.

The scheme, led by Professor Sir Munir Pirmohamed, from the University of Liverpool, and Professor Christopher Griffiths , from the University of Swag直播, provides world-class training to develop the next generation of research leaders in clinical pharmacology. This has been identified as a skills shortage priority area for UK across multiple stakeholders including healthcare, academia and industry.

The original scheme, started in 2010, has successfully trained 13 fellows with a focus on personalised medicine and drug safety science.

Just over £3m of funding has been awarded for the renewed scheme, the MRC providing £1.5m, and the Universities of Liverpool and Swag直播 providing £150K each to the scheme.

Partnerships with four major pharmaceutical companies (Eli Lilly, Novartis, Roche, UCB Pharma) have also been formed resulting in each of them committing £300K to the scheme. The aim again is to train 13 high-calibre clinical fellows.

The scheme will focus on three important disease areas of Oncology, Infectious Disease and Inflammation and Repair and each fellow will have the opportunity to utilise expertise in Drug Safety, Stratified Medicine and Systems Pharmacology.

New fellows will develop their research project in collaboration with at least one of the industry partners and will spend time at the industry partner facilities which will foster “without walls” research opportunities.

Professor Sir Munir Pirmohamed, said: “The renewal of the scheme by MRC, together with the support from four global pharmaceutical companies, is a validation of the success of the initial programme, highlights our strengths in clinical pharmacology and allows us to continue to address the national skills shortage in this important clinical specialty”.

Professor Chris Griffiths, said: “We are delighted that this innovative and collaborative programme with industry has been renewed. It provides unique training in academic clinical pharmacology for fellows from a broad range of medical disciplines such as rheumatology, dermatology and oncology.

"Academic-industrial interfaces, as exemplified by the programme, will be an increasingly important aspect of translational research leading to high quality patient care.”

Dr Nathan Richardson, Head of Molecular & Cellular Medicine, MRC, adds: “The MRC Centre for Drug Safety Sciences at the University of Liverpool, with its strong partnerships with the University of Swag直播 and major pharmaceutical companies, continues to play a leading national role in understanding drug safety and off-target affects. With excellent leadership the Centre offers an outstanding environment to help the UK build a stronger cadre of clinician scientists with pharmacology skills and industry experience. We are delighted to renew our investment through this important training scheme.”

For more information regarding the scheme please visit

A blood test could predict how well small-cell lung cancer (SCLC) patients will respond to treatment, according to new research published in Nature Medicine today.

Scientists, based at the Cancer Research UK Swag直播 Institute at Swag直播, isolated tumour cells that had broken away from the main cancer - known as circulating tumour cells (CTCs) - from the blood of 31 patients with this aggressive form of the disease.

When researchers analysed these cells, they discovered that patterns of genetic faults measured before treatment were linked to how well and how long a patient might respond to chemotherapy.

Obtaining a tumour sample from lung cancer patients using an operation, known as a biopsy, can be difficult because the tumour is hard to reach and samples are often too small to reveal useful clues on how best to treat patients.

Liquid biopsies offer an alternative to taking tumour samples, providing a snapshot of the disease from a blood sample.

The team also investigated the genetic changes that occurred in patients who initially responded well to treatment but later relapsed. The pattern in these cells was different from patients who didn’t respond well to chemotherapy, suggesting different mechanisms of drug resistance had developed.

Lead researcher Professor Caroline Dive, based at the Cancer Research UK Swag直播 Institute, said: “Our study reveals how blood samples could be used to anticipate how lung cancer patients may respond to treatments.

“Unfortunately, we have very few treatment options for patients with SCLC, and none at all for those whose cancer is resistant to chemotherapy.

“By identifying differences in the patterns of genetic faults between patients, we now have a starting point to begin to understand more about how drug resistance develops in patients with this aggressive form of lung cancer.”

Dr Emma Smith, Cancer Research UK’s science information manager, said: “Lung cancer causes more than one in five of all cancer deaths in the UK and it’s vital that we find effective new treatments to fight the disease and save more lives.

“These liquid biopsies are an incredibly exciting area of research. Studies like this help build a bigger picture of the disease, pointing the way to developing new treatments that are urgently needed for people with lung cancer.”

As part of World Antibiotic Awareness Week (14-20 November), Swag直播 has announced a new programme of visits to local primary schools to spread the message about using these medicines in a way that helps prevent the serious problem of bacteria becoming resistant to them.

They are also supporting to spread the message about this crisis.

Humanity and the wider environment is in the ‘pre-antibiotic era’, with the natural process of bacteria evolving to resist antibiotics – and this has been speeded up because many people get antibiotics when they don’t need them (in some countries they can just buy from their corner shop), and even in the UK, people commonly fail to take their full prescription without realising this adds to antibiotic resistance.

Another major threat comes from the massive use of antibiotics in agriculture. With a lack of new antibiotics in development, this problem is already causing longer hospital stays and increased difficulty in treating illnesses such as pneumonia and tuberculosis. Ultimately it is now known to be causing millions of deaths around the world, including in the UK.

Without effective antibiotics, organ transplantations, chemotherapy and surgery such as caesarean sections become much more dangerous. Already, 25,000 people a year die across Europe from infections resistant to antibiotics.

Lydia Bagg, a fourth year said: “Working with young children is a fantastic opportunity to get them to think about different medicines. We’ll be using games and quizzes to give simple messages about reducing the spread of germs and reducing antibiotic resistance.”

The school visits are not the only activity planned by the University. , Senior Lecturer in , has formed a partnership with two prominent student societies: the Global Health Society and the Medics in Primary Schools society.

Working with the GHS, on Thursday, 17 November, members of the public are invited to attend an open evening of presentations, where local, national and international experts on subjects relating to antibiotic resistance will be presented.

Clarissa Hemmingsen, first year medical student and President of the Global Health Society said that: “Interest in this week’s event is overwhelming –it’s a brilliant way for the public and students to learn about antibiotic resistance and differences in other countries.”

The event features leading experts from Thailand, the US, and in the UK from London, Oxford and closer to home in Swag直播.

Dr Harrison said: “This work all about getting the message out to people; that around the world we’ve have turned to antibiotics too often, and even used them when science shows it’s impossible for them to help, such as with a basic cold.”

He went on to say how: “There are thousands of students coming to Swag直播 every year – so it’s not only the public we’re concerned about. Using support from the student societies is brilliant and makes links across different degree courses too.”

Event: , Supported by the British Society for Antimicrobial Therapy, Antibiotic Action, and Antibiotic Guardian.

Thu 17 November 2016, 17:30 – 20:30 at Citylabs, Nelson Street, Swag直播, M13 9NQ

#AntibioticResistance

Antibiotic resistance: What can I do?

• Antibiotics don’t have any effect on treating colds and flu symptoms
• If you’re worried about your health then speak to a local community pharmacist, or a member of your primary health care team
• Take antibiotics exactly as prescribed, never save them for later and never share them with others
• Spread the word: tell your friends and family about antibiotic resistance
• Play your part and show you’re an Antibiotic Guardian

Experts are warning of a significant increase in the number of people in the UK who are living with invasive and serious fungal diseases that affect the lungs, bloodstream and brain and can sometimes lead to death.

While invasive fungal infections were estimated by the Health Protection Agency in 2006 a new report is the first comprehensive attempt to capture how many people in the UK suffer from fungal asthma.

Asthma in adults is common in the UK with over 4 million reported cases, and researchers in Swag直播 believe as many as 300,000 of them are affected by fungal asthma.

The research from the National Aspergillosis Centre based at Swag直播 – is published by .

Fungal asthma is such a big problem because the UK has one of the highest rates of asthma internationally. The range of estimate reflects uncertainty as no community study has ever been done, despite the large number affected. Asthmatics allergic to and exposed to higher amounts of fungi that they breathe in usually have poor asthma control and require steroid boosters. Antifungal therapy benefits these people, and may prevent deaths from asthma, doctors believe.

Invasive aspergillosis is the commonest missed infectious diagnosis in intensive care in the UK. It is always fatal without therapy and affects from 3,288 to 4,257 patients each year, most undiagnosed. Treated invasive aspergillosis has a 30-85 per cent mortality depending on the patient group.

Dr Bradford Winters in 2012 analysed deaths in intensive care, and invasive aspergillosis was the commonest missed infectious diagnosis.

Pneumocystis pneumonia has been increasing, especially in the non-HIV group, and probably affects over 500 annually. 15-50 per cent of these patients die, even if treated.

Although 1,700 cases of Candida bloodstream infections are reported annually, the actual estimate of tissue invasive cases in hospitalised and critically ill people is 5,124. This carries a ~45% mortality, if diagnosed and treated.

A Health Protection Agency report from 2006 estimated that ~66 per cent of those who die of fungal infection could have been saved with faster recognition and rapid diagnosis.

Experts believe rarer infections and antifungal resistant infections are probably on the increase, including Candida auris and multi-resistant Aspergillus fumigatus derived from the environment.

Swag直播’s , Director of , explained: “While the UK is rich in data sources, there is a remarkable poverty of contemporary studies of fungal diseases. An accurate estimate of total burden will ultimately rely on improved diagnostic testing and laboratory reporting.

“This report gets us closer to true burden of fungal diseases in the UK – necessary for improved diagnosis and reducing death. The scale of the ‘fungal asthma’ problem is staggering, and potentially remediable with antifungal therapy, as I know from treating hundreds of affected patients,” he added.

The paper, ‘’ M. Pegorie, D.W. Denning, W. Welfare was published in the Journal of Infection. doi: 10.1016/j.jinf.2016.10.005

With an HIV infection rate of around 7.2%, Uganda has a particular problem with the serious effects of fungal infection which takes hold in vulnerable people. However, the branch of medicine which deals with these infections, medical mycology, is under-resourced with a lack of specialist doctors and trained laboratory staff.

But now, Ugandan doctor Felix Bongomin is set to change all that using the skills he’s gained on a funded master’s course at Swag直播.

Inspired by lectures given in his home country by visiting University of Swag直播 professor and fungal infection expert , Felix applied for an . This programme, unique to Swag直播, covers the fees and expenses of exceptional students from Uganda, Rwanda and Tanzania who have a desire and a plan to benefit their home countries.

In Felix’s case that led him to study an to learn the skills that he can pass on to students and medics and use to help his patients.

“As a medical intern, I found that fungal infections were among the trickiest cases on the wards," He says. "Due to a lack of specialist medical mycologists to consult, and the laboratories, which are ill-equipped for diagnosis, there is often recurrence of infections and a lack of knowledge of the resistance patterns of anti-fungal agents.”

He intends to continue working with patients and has big plans for the establishment of the discipline in the country. “Being a mycologist means I’ll be an important human resource for Uganda. I plan to establish a research institute which will be responsible for setting up good-quality fungal diagnostic and treatment services countrywide.”

Getting to this stage would not have been possible for Felix in Uganda, as the course he wanted to study doesn’t yet exist there. He was also unable to fund study abroad so the Equity and Merit Scholarship in Swag直播 has given him the opportunity to work with specialists and learn unique skills.

Professor Denning said: “When I visited Gulu University in 2012 to set up a research project into the fungal complications of TB, I didn’t imagine that my talk to the students and young doctors there would bring such a talented young physician to Swag直播 in my favourite subject. Felix has not only concluded his master’s, but his project will be published and, crucially, fill a gap in our knowledge of subtle immunodeficiency.”

Felix believes the benefits of his learning will resonate far beyond his own career – helping the medical professionals of the future too. He said: “This scholarship will allow me to become a lecturer at my university and so my students and so many other people will benefit from my studies.”

Felix’s story is the third in a series of four videos and articles to mark the tenth anniversary of the Equity and Merit Scholarship programme at Swag直播. The scholarships are jointly funded by the University and its donors. The University covers the tuition fee in full and the generosity of donors covers students’ living costs, flights to the UK and visas.

Since it began, a total of 203 scholarships have been awarded to exceptional individuals who have demonstrated both academic excellence and a commitment to the economic or social development of their home communities.

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Visit the on our website or for more information.

Scientists funded by the British Heart Foundation have discovered that oxidants, which have historically been blamed for heart disease, have a vital role ensuring the heart pumps blood around the body effectively. The discovery, by researchers working collaboratively in Swag直播 and London, opens up the potential for new treatments.

The researchers now hope to develop drugs based on their discovery that could lower blood pressure and treat conditions caused by the heart not pumping properly, including certain forms of heart failure.

The study, published today in Nature Communications, found that when the heart relaxes oxidants are released which activate an enzyme called Protein Kinase G (PKG), in a process called oxidation. The oxidation of PKG helps to ensure the amount of blood entering the heart is the same as the amount pumped out. This is vital in the functioning of a healthy heart.

However, when the researchers looked at the hearts of mice with a form of PKG that cannot be oxidised, they found that their hearts did not fill with blood properly and that their heart function was compromised.

The findings in the heart were complemented by BHF-funded research on arteries published recently in Science Signaling. The BHF researchers found activation of PKG by oxidants is also critical for the way arteries sense high blood pressure and then relax.

The researchers, led by BHF Research Fellow Dr Adam Greenstein from Swag直播, found that when arteries sense high blood pressure inside them they generate oxidants which activate PKG. The activation of PKG in response to pressure then relaxes the arteries. In mice with PKG that cannot be oxidised, the arteries constricted more strongly and this caused high blood pressure. 

The scientists believe that dysregulation of the activation of PKG may occur in several cardiovascular diseases. They now hope to develop drugs which can mimic the oxidant-induced relaxation of the heart and arteries, to treat patients with problems in the way their hearts fill and pump blood around the body. This may also be valuable in lowering blood pressure.

“These new papers demonstrate just how important PKG is in the regulation of the heart and blood vessels," said Professor Jeremy Pearson, Associate Medical Director at the British Heart Foundation, which funded the research. “The studies provide strong evidence that new drugs which target PKG activation are likely to be useful in patients suffering with heart failure or with high blood pressure.”

You can find out more about the BHF’s fight against heart disease at .

COVID-19 clarification – April 2020 – the article below, published in 2016, was an overview of early stage research carried out at Swag直播. The facemask coatings that were being developed showed some potential in filtering the influenza virus (H1N1), but at no point was the performance of these materials evaluated regarding their ability to filter coronaviruses.

Facemasks incorporating an innovative new technology which emerged from research conducted by Swag直播’s School of Chemistry will be able to comprehensively trap and kill over 99 percent of all flu viruses.

Given the ability to treat inexpensive materials, the antiviral coating technology developed by the University alongside Virustatic has numerous product applications. The first product being developed for Sterling Materials is an antiviral facemask, which will provide the only protection to an influenza pandemic and will be vital in saving millions of lives.

During the 1918 pandemic, approximately 20% to 40% of the worldwide population became ill and it has been estimated that 50 million people died globally. Although the H1N1 influenza outbreak in 2009 is described as ‘relatively benign’, it was a novel virus that nonetheless infected more than 60 million people, with over a quarter of a million hospitalisations and 12,000 deaths recorded in the US alone.Calling pandemic influenza ‘one of the most severe natural challenges likely to affect the UK’, Government guidance further states pandemic influenza emerges as a result of a new flu virus which is markedly different from recently circulating strains. Few - if any - people will have any immunity to this new virus thus allowing it to spread easily and to cause more serious illness.

The conditions that allow a new virus to develop and spread continue to exist, and some features of modern society, such as air travel, could accelerate the rate of spread. Experts therefore agree that there is a high probability of a pandemic occurring, although the timing and impact are impossible to predict.

The Swag直播 research team, led by Professor Sabine Flitsch, identified a coating to mimic the surface of the cells in the human oesophagus and nasal passages. The method can capture over 99% of all flu viruses, including new strains of pandemic flu that come into contact with it. Virustatic and the University are leading the prototype testing for the impregnated fabric for Sterling Materials.

Paul Hope, Virustatic’s Technical Director and Inventor, is confident that the combination of research excellence and business acumen will move the technology into mainstream use.

“Great ideas have a habit of becoming bad – or even non-existent – products. The ability to commercialise research is very difficult and the expense often outweighs benefits. Put simply, many commercial products using research breakthroughs are just too expensive to sell.

A University of Swag直播 study which looked at more than thirty years of research into bipolar, found that people with the disorder are 2.63 times more likely to have suffered emotional, physical or sexual abuse as children than the general population.

In the study, published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, the researchers identified 19 studies from hundreds published between 1980 and 2014 which gathered data from millions of patient records, interviews and assessments.

By applying rigorous statistical analysis to the data, the researchers compared the likelihood of people with and without bipolar disorder having adverse childhood experiences, such as physical, emotional and sexual abuse. The findings revealed a strong link between these events and subsequent diagnosis.

Bipolar disorder is characterised by extreme depressive and manic states which impair quality of life and increase suicide risk. An urgent need in this field is better understanding of risk factors that can be used to improve detection and treatment.

Dr Filippo Varese, one of the study authors, said: “Much research into bipolar has focussed on bio-genetics, but following previous work on schizophrenia, we felt that a similar effect could be found in bipolar. The link between experiencing a troubled childhood and subsequently being diagnosed with this serious condition is extremely strong.”

The authors defined childhood adversity as experiencing neglect, abuse, bullying or the loss of a parent before the age of 19. There was a particularly strong link between emotional abuse with this four times more likely to have happened to people with bipolar. However, the loss of a parent did not raise the risk significantly.

The ‘meta-analysis’ approach has been applied in this study for the first time in relation to bipolar disorder and childhood adversity and, as a result, the findings represent a much larger pool of data than has been previously available.

The findings have implications for those providing treatment, as they can factor in these childhood experiences when developing personalised therapy plans.

Dr Jasper Palmier-Claus, the lead author, added: “Handled sensitively, enquiries about a person’s childhood experiences can make a significant difference to how treatment proceeds and the types of support that can be put into place.”

The paper, ‘The relationship between childhood adversity and bipolar disorder: A systematic review and meta-analysis’, was published in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

Swag直播 has been awarded more than £5m for research into using nanomaterials including graphene in the human body.

The £5.2m grant was provided by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) for the project titled: ‘2D Materials for Next Generation Healthcare Technologies’ (2D-Health) that aims to further explore how two-dimensional materials can improve major health challenges, such as cancer, diabetes and dementia.

The announcement was made today by Jo Johnson MP, Minister of State for Universities and Science, as part of £17.7m for new healthcare technologies research to address the health issues of an aging UK population.

Swag直播 is home to the Nanomedicine Lab, which brings together bioengineering, pharmacology and nanotechnology and their translation to advanced, clinically-relevant therapeutics and diagnostics.

Potential areas of benefit using graphene and other 2D materials could include targeted drug delivery systems to attack cancer cells while leaving other cells unharmed, remote electrical stimulation of nerves affected by neurodegenerative and other diseases, such as diabetes or smart dressings for burns and wounds to allow faster healing and minimise damage to tissue.

Key to taking fundamental research forward to benefit patients is industrial engagement and four major healthcare partners are also part of the project. Two specialist SME graphene companies, Versarien and Graphenea, will also collaborate with materials and industrial upscale expertise.

Graphene, the world’s first two-dimensional material, was first isolated in 2004 at Swag直播, and has the potential to revolutionise a large number of applications, including those in medicine – from providing clean drinking water for third-world communities to anti-cancer treatments, from the aircraft of the future to flexible, bendable mobile phones and tablets.

The Nanomedicine Lab at Swag直播 is led by Professor Kostas Kostarelos, a world-leading researcher in using nanomaterials for biomedical applications.

The 2D-Health project involves various laboratories from across Swag直播, spanning physics, chemistry, pharmacy and medicine, in a truly cross-cutting faculty effort.

It aims to extend the use of 2D materials such as graphene in developing therapies and technologies for wound care and management (relevant to diabetes); neural rehabilitation by electrical stimulation (relevant to dementia); cell therapeutics (relevant to ophthalmological and cardiovascular disease); and immunotherapeutics (relevant to cancer).

Professor Kostarelos said: “We are delighted both with the decision by the EPSRC to fund our ambitious research programme and the pharmaceutical industry support that has enthusiastically embraced 2D material technologies as particularly promising.

“We are all looking forward to developing a thorough and systematic understanding of the true capabilities graphene and 2D materials offer in solving current clinical challenges, and maintain Swag直播 and the UK at the forefront of this dynamic and highly competitive field.’’

Universities and Science Minister, Jo Johnson said: “The UK is a world leader in medical breakthroughs and home to innovative healthcare companies that know how to turn our expertise into good business. This investment will help diagnose cardiovascular diseases, treat debilitating illnesses, and ultimately improve the lives of millions of patients and their families.”

Professor Philip Nelson, Chief Executive of EPSRC, said: “More of us are living longer than before. It is vital for us to continue to invest in science and engineering research so we can ensure we have active, healthy and high quality later years.

“The EPSRC is striving to make the UK a healthy nation and one where research, discovery and innovation flourishes. These programmes will help deliver both of these objectives.”

The other research programmes will be led by Imperial College London, the University of Leeds, and University of Glasgow.

A gene dubbed the ‘Teashirt’ by its discoverers has been identified as a link between children with kidney problems and autism, in a new study which has implications for how doctors working on both conditions administer tests to their patients.

The new paper, published in the journal Nature Genetics, was led by the Developmental Biology Institute of Marseille, collaborating with Swag直播, and it describes the effects of mutations of Teashirt in people and mice.

The gene, formally named Tshz3, had already been implicated by the joint research team in 2008 as being essential for development of smooth muscle in the wall of the ureter. Mutant mice were born with ‘blown-up’ kidneys because their ureters failed to actively propel urine down to the bladder.

Professor Adrian Woolf from Swag直播, then working as a children’s consultant in London, discovered that one of his patients born with abnormal kidneys had a deleted Tshz3 gene and also displayed characteristics of autistic spectrum disorder.

The French team also realised that mice with Tshz3 mutation not only had kidney problems but also displayed learning difficulties.

The findings sparked a global search of other kidney clinics, which returned ten more patients with similar symptoms. After genetic testing, it was confirmed that the same gene was missing in all of them – findings which are published in the new paper.

Professor Woolf said: “The mutant mouse kidney looks just like ‘hydronephrosis’, the distended kidney seen in about 1 in 1,000 individuals when they are screened by sonar scans as unborn babies. It now appears that this gene is linked to at least some of these cases and that it also has implications for how our brains work in childhood.”

The research was led by Professor Laurent Fasano in Marseille who discovered the teashirt gene in fruit flies in 1991. He said: “The sooner the better; early detection of this new condition will favour early behavioural therapies, which is good for the kids and their family.”

The link between the two diseases has implications for how doctors work with patients who display either kidney or learning problems.

Professor Woolf, who is also a consultant at the Royal Swag直播 Children’s Hospital where he runs a renal genetics clinic, added: “A fairly simple genetic test on patients being treated for either kidney problems or autistic spectrum disorder could identify whether the Teashirt gene is missing and also highlight that the patient may need investigation for the other condition. Time will tell whether TSHZ3 plays a role in many more cases than we’ve currently been able to identify.”

The paper ('Tshz3 deletion causes an autism syndrome and defects in cortical projection neurons' ; DOI 10.1038/ng.3681) will be published in the journal Nature Genetics on 26 September 2016. Research was part-funded by the Medical Research Council.

New guidelines issued by the National Institute for Health & Care Excellence (NICE) for managing patients with more than one long-term condition recommend a tailored approach to patient care focused on individual preferences, needs and priorities.

To coincide with the guidelines, a new online resource has been launched to help patients with several long term conditions – multimorbidity – not only self-manage their treatment approaches across their multiple conditions but help influence the tailored nature of treatment required by NICE in the new guidelines.

The “living with multiple health problems” section presents patients’ experiences of coping with the complexities of multiple illnesses; users of the website are able to access more than 200 extracts in video, audio or written format from interviews with real patients discussing various aspects of living with multimorbidity as well as advice on self-management of treatments and juggling all the required medication across multiple conditions.

It is estimated that approximately one quarter of the UK population are living with two or more health conditions – including diabetes, arthritis and heart disease – and this figure is set to rise as the population ages.

The main challenges facing patients with multiple conditions are managing sometimes conflicting treatments, deciding what to prioritise, coordinating the care received from different professionals and generally overcoming sometimes poor communication from those professionals.

Communication is the key to managing multimorbidity, according to Dr Gavin Daker-White, Research Fellow at Swag直播’s School of Health Sciences who led the analysis of the interviews for the web resource.

“Getting a new diagnosis on top of existing diseases can be a bit of blow. Patients will quite likely be asking themselves – and their healthcare providers – what does it all mean now and how am I going to cope?

”healthtalk.org aims to take users on a person-based journey through the issues of multimorbidity; users can see and hear 38 people sharing their stories about the effects of health problems on their lives and their experiences of using health services. They talk about how they deal with the challenges brought by multiple health problems, for example by prioritising which health problem is the most important. They talk about where the health service has worked well for them and where it hasn't. Their advice for other patients and recommendations for improving care are offered – along with advice on taking control of their multiple medicines and other treatments.” 

Development of the multimorbidity section was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), and is part of the wider healthtalk.org website. healthtalk.org (formerly dipex then healthtalkonline and youthhealthtalk) was created in 2001 by Oxford GP Dr Ann McPherson CBE and Dr Andrew Herxheimer after their own experiences of illness. Ann had been diagnosed with breast cancer and although she knew about the medical side, couldn't find anyone to talk to about what it was really like to have the disease. This, and Andrew's experience of knee replacement surgery, prompted them to come up with the innovative idea of a patient experience website.

The website has sections on more than 90 diseases, conditions and other health issues – all sharing experiences in video, audio or written format from people affected by each individual illness or health issue. Healthtalk.org is primarily a resource for patients, their families and friends, but is also valuable in educating health and social care professionals about patient perspectives of illness.

The Centre for Primary Care has produced a outlining the safe, integrated, and effective care for people with multimorbidity.

Today history has been made as a single Swag直播 bid has been awarded £28.5m from the NIHR, bringing lifesaving tests and treatments a step nearer for millions of people.

The bid has only been made possible through bringing together the recognised clinical and research expertise from across health and academia, which demonstrates the connectivity and collaboration that is central to making Greater Swag直播 devolution a success.

The successful bid has been hosted by Central Swag直播 University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, in partnership with Swag直播 and the partnership also involves The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust, University Hospital of South Swag直播 NHS Foundation Trust and is supported by . It will see Swag直播 granted prestigious NIHR Biomedical Research Centre status.

This will drive forward pioneering research into new tests and treatments in the areas of musculoskeletal disease, hearing health, respiratory disease and dermatology and three themes (prevention, radiotherapy and precision medicine).

Swag直播’s researchers impressed an international panel of experts with their unique proposals that will accelerate the translation of early stage research into new diagnostic tests and treatments to benefit patients of all ages and backgrounds in Greater Swag直播 and beyond. This will make Swag直播 ideally placed to attract further research investment that will give our patients early access to new and ground-breaking treatments and will deliver wider value to the economy.

Jon Rouse, Chief Officer of , the body overseeing the devolution of the £6bn health and social care budget, said:

"The new partnership approach under devolution means that we have both the opportunity – and the means – to combine the talents of people from a whole range of areas to benefit our population. This hugely welcome funding is recognition that in Greater Swag直播 we can combine the best clinical skills with the best research, innovation and academic talent to take huge steps in improving the health and wellbeing of our people.’

, Director of the NIHR Swag直播 BRC, added: “Working closely with patients, we will use the latest advances in biology, medicine and health technology to better predict disease and likely treatment response. The new diagnostic tests and therapies we develop will enable doctors to offer a more tailored approach and to better personalise treatments to the individual. We are also working on better ways to prevent disease developing in the first place.”

Sir Mike Deegan, Chief Executive of Central Swag直播 University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, explained: “The achievement of a BRC for Swag直播 is a landmark moment which will see £28.5m directly invested into finding new ways of preventing, predicting and treating some of the major causes of premature death and disability,” commented “Bringing together our research expertise has only been made possible by the unique connectivity which devolution provides.”

Professor Dame Nancy Rothwell, President and Vice-Chancellor of Swag直播, said: “The BRC focuses the research efforts of the University and NHS Partners so that we can address the considerable health needs of Greater Swag直播. As the areas of research being targeted by the BRC represent complex global health issues our work also has the potential to have an impact much further afield.”

Roger Spencer, Chief Executive of The Christie, said: “Having a BRC that focuses on three areas of cancer research is to be warmly welcomed. Together with cutting edge advances in treatment such as the new proton beam therapy unit, The Christie is improving research into cancer which means we will be even better able to serve the health needs of this region.”

Professor Ian Greer, Vice-President and Dean of Swag直播's commented: “This award presents us with a fantastic opportunity to build on our existing, very successful relationships with our NHS partners in MAHSC to help deliver a real step-change in health research across Swag直播.

"All seven research themes are led by academics based in the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health; and our ability to deliver tangible benefits under each of the seven areas has undoubtedly been enhanced by the closer alignment of discovery, clinical and health sciences during the creation of FBMH. As each BRC theme becomes established, there will be many opportunities for colleagues across the Faculty to make a contribution and to establish new collaborations with our partner organisations.

“The seven BRC themes, led by Faculty academics, will also help to realise our ambition of developing a truly translational approach to biology, medicine and health, and ultimately have a very real and positive impact on people’s lives.”

The seven research themes

Cancer

Theme 1: Cancer Prevention and Early Detection
Lead:

Around 50% of people in the UK will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime. Cancer prevention and early detection strategies are not currently fully leveraged despite having an important role to play in the fight against cancer.

The BRC will help to improve the targeting of these strategies, by developing the early markers needed to diagnose cancer sooner and rapidly identify whether a treatment is having the desired response.

Theme 2: Advanced radiotherapy
Lead:

Radiotherapy has an important role to play in the fight against cancer. Around 40% of those patients cured of cancer have received radiotherapy as part of their treatment.

The BRC will improve the delivery of radiation and develop markers to predict the benefit of different types of radiation and drug-radiation combinations, as well as the risk of long-term side effects,”

Theme 3: Cancer precision medicine
Lead:

The BRC will help the NHS to deliver a more personalised and proactive approach to caring for patients with cancer. Through the precise characterisation of tumours, its research will enable us to develop the diagnostic tests needed to match an individual’s cancer with the drug most likely to have the desired therapeutic effect.

Work will also focus on helping clinicians to anticipate and appropriately manage drug resistant relapse, a common problem faced by patients with cancer.

Musculoskeletal diseases

Theme 4: Musculoskeletal disease
Lead:

Musculoskeletal disorders, such as arthritis and connective tissue diseases, account for over 20% of all GP consultations and are the second most common cause of disability worldwide.

Building on the work of our NIHR Swag直播 Musculoskeletal Biomedical Research Unit, the BRC will focus on strategies to prevent arthritis developing in the first place. We are also developing new treatment approaches to arthritis in adults and children and new tests to improve our ability to personalise treatments used. .

Hearing health

Theme 5: Hearing health
Lead:

Hearing loss will soon be the 7^th largest global disease burden. It represents a major public health issue with substantial economic and societal costs. The BRC is focused on the rapid adoption of discoveries into routine clinical practice to improve health and wellbeing, reduce inequalities and provide value for money.

The BRC will help deliver effective and efficient hearing health across the lifespan – from preventing potentially devastating inherited deafness through to age-related deafness.

Respiratory diseases

Theme 6: Respiratory disease
Lead:

Respiratory diseases are the third most common cause of death and the second most common cause of hospital admissions in the UK.

The BRC will build a better understanding of the underlying causes of respiratory conditions and test new drug compounds aimed at novel targets to modify the disease processes involved and improve symptom control in patients.

Research will focus on earlier diagnosis and more targeted treatment, to maximise the likelihood of a good treatment response for an individual whilst minimising the risks of harm from therapies such as antimicrobial resistance.

Dermatology

Theme 7: Cutaneous inflammation and repair
Lead:

Skin conditions and poor wound healding have a considerable impact on many people’s quality of life.

The BRC will identify markers and tools, which can be used to personalise treatment plans and identify opportunities to address unmet clinical need for patients suffering from complex wounds, psoriasis, hair loss and light-sensitive conditions.

A group of scientists have found that a single molecule from a bacterial cell wall component can lead to the unusual behaviour of 100 million clotting molecules in blood, which may be a major contributor to many diseases including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and diabetes. The discovery could help to explain many features of these kinds of diseases, and may lead to new methods of prevention or treatment.

A team from Swag直播, together with South African colleagues from The University of Pretoria, tested blood and plasma for its ability to clot when the normal clotting agent thrombin was added. Normal, healthy blood clots have a nice spaghetti-like appearance. However, the results showed that tiny amounts of cell wall molecules such as lipopolysaccharide (LPS), which are shed by dormant bacteria, caused a highly anomalous clot to form dense deposits with very different fibres.

These can contribute to the chronic inflammation that is part of many supposedly non-infectious diseases. These include Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ‘auto-immune’ conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, cardiovascular problems such as stroke, and metabolic diseases including type 2 diabetes.

The discovery could have considerable impact on the treatment of these conditions, since stopping the unusual clotting could stop its consequences. Existing treatments do not do this, as the new mechanism had not previously been known.

The work is part of an ongoing collaboration funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council to understand unusual blood clotting.

Resia Pretorius, from the Department of Physiology at The University of Pretoria, said “The importance of LPS in inflammatory diseases has been mostly overlooked, and has been used to induce both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease in animal testing for many years. Inflammatory diseases are also closely linked to Leaky Gut Syndrome. Together with our new findings regarding the involvement of a (dormant) blood microbiome, this demonstrates that dormant bacteria can play an important role in all inflammatory diseases.”

The world is in the grip of a global crisis that kills the equivalent of the populations of Philadelphia, Kampala or Prague - around 1.6 million each year.

A new report by a University of Swag直播 academic, published today in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, documents how many countries do not have life-saving antifungal therapies.

Fungal infections attack the lungs and may spread through the body and, without the drugs to fight back, claim the lives of over 3,500 people every day.

Now GAFFI () has gathered together the most powerful weapon there is – knowledge – information that it plans to use to bring about change.

It has today published the largest survey ever undertaken from 159 countries and found that two critical antifungal medicines for AIDS patients are not available in over 95 countries. One of these antifungals has been available since the 1950s and the other since the 1970s.

of Swag直播, President of GAFFI and the paper’s lead author says it beggars belief that hundreds of millions of people cannot access the optimal therapy for fungal meningitis and fungal lung infections.

“It is doubly tragic,” he said, “That these antifungals have been used since the late 1950s in the case of amphotericin B. Yet the systems for delivering these drugs to the most needy are still not in place.

“Last year GAFFI called on governments to provide fungal diagnostics and antifungal drugs to all their citizens yet there has been a deafening silence. There is clearly a long way to go, but the tragedy is that every day thousands more people die needlessly while the world turns a blind eye,” he added.

Actor and GAFFI celebrity patron Rupert Everett declared that: “We have known for over 25 years that many people with AIDS and cancer do die of fungal complications. And death is avoidable with treatment. Why on earth are commonly used antifungal medicines not provided to everyone who needs them?”

Dr Glenda Gray, President and CEO of the African Medical Research Council and Professor of Pediatrics, Faculty of Health Sciences, at University of Witwatersrand, said: “In South Africa we are addressing the HIV epidemic squarely on with greatly increased provision of anti-retroviral drugs and expanding testing.

“Fungal diseases in AIDS have not received the priority they should have, although this is now changing with our national screening program for Cryptococci meningitis. Clearly ensuring antifungal agents are available to all is an key component in reducing deaths and illness across southern Africa."

Key findings:

• One of the critical drugs for fungal meningitis in AIDS (amphotericin B) is not available in 42 countries. The other key drug for fungal meningitis, flucytosine, is unavailable in at least 95 countries. Yet both have been available in Europe and the US for over 40 years. The World Health Organization recommends they be used together to bring down mortality from 100% to 25%. Fungal meningitis is the commonest form of meningitis in sub-Saharan Africa because of AIDS.

• The 25 -year old drug, fluconazole is available in all countries and itraconazole is unavailable in just five countries. However, being available is not enough – price also matters as patients pay for their care in many countries. The daily cost of fluconazole varied from <$1 to $31 and itraconazole from <$1 to $102. In South Africa, which has the largest AIDS burden in the world and a massive TB problem, itraconazole costs about £11.60 per day – unaffordable for most people there.

*Kneale M, Bartholomew JS, Davies E, Denning DW. Global Access to Antifungal Therapy and its Variable Cost. J Antimicrob Chemother. In press.

Scientists in Swag直播, who have developed a stem cell gene therapy to reverse a fatal childhood illness, have agreed to work with a new therapeutics company to test it in a human trial.

University of Swag直播 and Central Swag直播 University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust () researchers have developed the pioneering approach for Sanfilippo disease (also known as mucopolysaccharidosis type III or MPS III) – a genetic condition for which there is currently no effective treatment.

The most common of the four types of Sanfilippo (type A) affects around 100 children in the UK, or one in 89,000 births, and it is this type that is targeted by the new treatment.

Sanfilippo is caused by a lack of the SGSH enzyme, which helps to break down and recycle long chain sugars. This results in a build-up of sugars in the body and particularly the brain.

Children with Sanfilippo begin showing symptoms of hyperactivity, severe behavioural problems and miss developmental milestones as toddlers. As they get older they show symptoms similar to dementia, and most never achieve a mental age beyond two years. Later they will experience seizures and difficulties in walking and swallowing. It is invariably fatal, with most children dying around the age of 18 years.

Following a licence agreement with , a new UK-based clinical-stage biotechnology company, the gene therapy developed in Swag直播 will be trialled in humans. Swag直播’s technology transfer company, , negotiated the terms of the major deal with Orchard Therapeutics.

, who leads the Stem Cell and Neurotherapies Laboratory at Swag直播 and developed the technique in partnership with the Trust scientists, said: “This license agreement with Orchard will allow us to take the technique we have developed to the next and crucial stage of trials in humans. We are hopeful that this treatment may help to treat the early onset dementia in these patients and saving children’s lives.

“If we can show that it is possible to treat single gene brain diseases, such as Sanfilippo, with stem cell gene therapy, this will pave the way for treating other lysosomal storage and neuro-metabolic disorders.”

The treatment works by genetically correcting the patients’ own stem cells and implanting them into bone marrow to release the missing enzyme in a way that reaches the brain, thereby correcting the condition.

The new study will take place at CMFT, supported by .

“There are currently no effective treatments available to children affected by Sanfilippo disease. We hope that this work will help to halt the progression of this devastating condition,” added Dr Simon Jones, Consultant in Paediatric Inherited Metabolic Disease at Saint Mary’s Hospital and the Swag直播 Centre for Genomic Medicine.

Professor Robert Wynn, Consultant Paediatric Haematologist at Royal Swag直播 Children’s Hospital and chief investigator for the clinical study explained: “This new clinical study aims to explore whether we can use stem cell gene therapy to produce blood cells that express corrected versions of the missing enzyme.

"We know that in conditions similar to Sanfilippo blood cells from a bone marrow donor can deliver such enzymes effectively. This new gene therapy builds on the decades of experience of CMFT physicians in bone marrow transplantation of children with these other metabolic diseases.”

Earlier attempts to cure the illness with a bone marrow transplant were unsuccessful as not enough enzyme was produced to have an effect, but the Swag直播 team has developed a way of overproducing the SGSH enzyme specifically in bone marrow white blood cells.

This was achieved by developing a lentiviral vector – a tool commonly used by molecular biologists to deliver genetic material into cells – specifically for use in humans, which will be tested in the trial. The lentiviral vector delivers the SGSH gene to bone marrow cells, which, when implanted into the body are able to traffic to both the bone marrow and the brain and deliver SGSH enzyme throughout the body, thus correcting the disease.

Recently a related illness metachromatic leukodystrophy has been treated by Italian scientists using a similar approach, with extremely promising results in patients.

The Swag直播 team used a similar lentiviral vector to the Italian team, but improved the design to make it more specific to the white blood cells that traffic into and engraft in the brain after a bone marrow transplant (monocytes/microglia). This improves brain targeting and effectiveness.

Professor Bobby Gaspar, Chief Scientific Officer of Orchard Therapeutics said:

“Stem cell gene therapy has shown promising effects in several different diseases and we are hopeful that this technology will change the lives of children with Sanfilippo type A and other monogenic bone marrow disorders in the near future.”

Life Sciences Minister, George Freeman MP, said: “This pioneering trial, led by UK researchers in partnership with a UK company, underlines exactly why we invest £1 billion each year through the National Institute for Health Research.

“This new gene therapy has the potential to change the lives of children with this dreadful condition, and will undoubtedly help to cement the UK’s position as a world-leader in medical research.”

Research from Swag直播 has found a shortfall in the uptake of influenza and pneumococcal vaccinations among those diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), potentially increasing their infection risk.

The team from looked at data from over 15,000 patients diagnosed with the disease who were being treated with certain types of immunosuppressive drugs, and found that one in five patients received no influenza vaccinations and one in two patients received no pneumonia vaccine over a five year follow-up period.

Patients with rheumatoid arthritis have double the normal risk of infection, due to a range of factors, compared to the rest of the population. Guidelines recommend that vaccinations should be used to protect against certain infections, such as influenza and pneumonia.

, who led the study, said: “There is no national data on vaccination uptake broken down in a way that allows us to pull out those with RA. Only one study in the US has looked at whether patients with rheumatic diseases are being vaccinated prior to starting immunosuppressive therapy.”

This large study used information from electronic patient records to assess the take-up of the two vaccines. It looked at 15,724 patients diagnosed with RA between 2000 and 2013.

The group found that those who were younger, who did not meet another clinical risk category, and who visited their GP less often were least likely to be vaccinated.

, a GP who was also part of the study team, added: “Guidance on influenza and pneumococcal vaccination for RA patients is unclear, and payment to carry it out in primary care is variable.

“In future it may be beneficial for rheumatologists to provide GPs with specific advice about appropriate vaccination for individual patients, or to consider administering the vaccinations themselves in their own clinics – either way, both approaches should be adequately funded.”

Richard Francis, head of research liaison and evaluation at , said: “Around 400,000 people in the UK live with the excruciating pain of rheumatoid arthritis. The impact of rheumatoid arthritis and the drugs used to treat the condition on the ability to fight infection is significant, and this study underscores the importance of vaccination in helping prevent the impact of influenza and other infections.”

Paper entitled ‘’, published in the journal PLoS One

Vast amounts of data generated by screening patients for diseases like cancer and arthritis at Swag直播 will now be used to improve treatment and drug safety in partnership with the University of Dundee.

The two universities have joined forces to transform medical treatment through protein analysis technology which identifies biomarkers of disease. This allows doctors to target treatments specific to the patient’s condition, and deliver the right treatment at the right time in the right dose.

This ‘precision medicine’ approach improves safety and effectiveness as patients are treated on an individual basis.

The new partnership will use data from work on and inflammatory disease biomarkers led by which is pioneering the application of ‘proteomics’, the large-scale analysis of proteins using state-of-the-art mass spectrometry instruments.

This enables the screening of patients for new protein diagnostic and disease markers and the segmentation of patient groups which can benefit from specific therapies and drug treatments.

This approach can also help reduce the risk of patients receiving treatments that cause harmful side-effects. In one example of the potential of this work, Professor Whetton and colleagues recently discovered a new biomarker for risk of ovarian cancer.

Professor Whetton said: “We are industrialising the approach to finding new biomarkers of diagnosis, prognosis and responses to therapy in medicine.”

This process will generate huge quantities of data and researchers from the University of Dundee will provide specialised software solutions for managing the big data involved in applying precision medicine. The Dundee team, led by Professor Angus Lamond, has pioneered proteomics research and software developments for the analysis of disease mechanisms.

Professor Whetton added: “Working with Professor Lamond and his world-leading team will give us a new ability to manage and analyse the huge amounts of data we will be generating. This offers exciting new opportunities for improving UK healthcare and to progress this field of research at pace and scale.”

The new collaboration combines the expertise of Swag直播 and Dundee to advance research on psoriasis, arthritis, cancer, lupus and other diseases and Professor Lamond, Director of the Laboratory of Quantitative Proteomics at the University of Dundee, believes that the better use of data can deliver significant benefits in these and other illnesses.

He said: “Efficient new computational tools are critical for handling the big data now emerging from biomedical and clinical laboratories.

“We are very enthusiastic at the prospect of working with Professor Whetton and his colleagues to help deliver the healthcare benefits from using proteomics and other innovative technologies.”

, Vice-President and Dean of at Swag直播 said: “Through ground-breaking collaboration that brings some of the UKs best scientists and resources on proteomics into focus on key disease areas, our universities are changing not only how we deliver scientific advances but also faster and greater impact on disease.”

A University of Swag直播 team is to develop a new vaccine against the Zika virus as part of a new initiative to counter the disease which has spread rapidly across the Americas in the last few months.

The team will create and test a vaccine based on a safe derivative of a pre-existing smallpox vaccine – the only disease to have been successfully globally eradicated.

, Honorary Senior Lecturer at Swag直播 and Fellow of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and Consultant in Infectious Diseases at North Swag直播 General Hospital and the Royal Liverpool Hospital will lead the project. and are University of Swag直播 experts involved in the project and the work will be done in collaboration with Professors Miles Carrol and Roger Hewson from Public Health England.

Dr Blanchard said: “As we have seen in the case of Ebola there is now a real need to react quickly to fast spreading tropical diseases. Zika can cause serious illness, but it often has no visible symptoms, so a vaccine for those at risk is one of the most effective ways we have of combatting it.”

Zika virus was first identified in Uganda in 1947 and the disease is mainly spread by mosquitoes, though there have been reports of human to human transmission. It is particularly serious for pregnant women, as it's been linked to birth defects – in particular, microcephaly, a condition where a baby’s brain doesn’t grow properly and it is born with an abnormally small head and serious development problems.

A recent and particularly severe outbreak which began in South America and has since spread north to United States Territories prompted , and to launch a £4m rapid response funding initiative at the beginning of February.

The results of this call for proposals have been announced today and Dr Blanchard and his team were awarded £177,713 to build and test a vaccine as part of this.

It is expected that the results will be delivered within 18 months and although the first target will be the Zika virus, the nature of the vaccine candidate may enable it to combat many infectious diseases simultaneously.

Dr Blanchard added: “We know that there’s an urgent need for this vaccine but we’ll be working carefully to deliver a product which is safe and effective and which can be quickly deployed to those who need it.”

“If we can also use this vaccine on multiple targets then this will represent an exciting step forward in dealing with these kinds of outbreaks.”

Researchers have identified a protein that controls how breast cancer cells spread around the body, according to a Cancer Research UK-funded study published in Science Signaling and carried out at Swag直播.

This study sheds light on how cancer cells leave the blood vessels to travel to a new part of the body, using a technique that allows researchers to map how cancer cells interact and exchange information with cells that make up the blood vessels.

When tumour cells spread, they first enter the blood stream and grip onto the inner walls of blood vessels. The researchers found that the cancer cells control a receptor protein called EPHA2 in order to push their way out of the vessels.

When cancer cells interact with the walls of the blood vessels, EPHA2 is activated and the tumour cells remain inside the blood vessels. When the EPHA2 is inactive, the tumour cells can push out and spread.

, who led the research at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and at Cancer Research UK’s at the University of Swag直播, said: “The next step is to figure out how to keep this receptor switched on, so that the tumour cells can’t leave the blood vessels – stopping breast cancer spreading and making the disease easier to treat successfully.”

Nell Barrie, ’s senior science information manager, said: “This is important research that teaches us more about how breast cancer cells move.

"Research like this is vital to help our understanding of how cancer spreads, and how to stop this from happening. More research is needed before this will benefit patients but it’s a jump in the right direction.”

Paper: Locard-Paulet M. et al., ‘’. Science Signaling, 2016. DOI: 10.1126/scisignal.aac5820

Cancer is one of Swag直播’s - examples of pioneering discoveries, interdisciplinary collaboration and cross-sector partnerships that are tackling some of the biggest questions facing the planet.

The healing powers of honey have been known for thousands of years. Now a graduate from Swag直播 has discovered a powerful link between a medicinal type of honey and the destruction of a fungus that can cause blindness or even death.

In the first study of its kind, student Zain Habib Alhindi used different concentrations of , a biologically engineered honey that produces chemically reactive molecules containing oxygen, to test how effective it could be in destroying the fungus Fusarium, which is found on plants and in soil and can cause devastating infections in vulnerable people.

Zain discovered even the lowest concentrations had a significant effect in breaking down the cell wall of the fungus, demonstrating its potential as a future treatment for patients.

She said: “Chronic infections, such as those found in long-lasting wounds comprise about 60-80 per cent of infectious diseases in humans and the way fungi invades wounds is associated with the use of broad-spectrum antibiotics.

“However, we know that biofilms - thin layers of microorganisms, which group together - contribute to the severity and delayed healing of chronic wounds.

“Through my research I wanted to show the potential for honey as a healing agent to break through these biofilms and in doing so increase the process of healing. What I found amazing is that honey actually works better than some antifungals.”

Zain (29) from Saudi Arabia is one of only handful of students who have completed The University’s new master’s degree course in which runs for just one year instead of the customary two, making it a world first.

Because of the way the course is structured Zain was able to spend almost a third of her time in the lab working on experiments to test her theory under the supervision of , Senior Lecturer in Infectious Diseases in The University’s .

Dr Rautemaa-Richardson believes it’s this intensive, hands-on approach, which appeals to her students and equips them for a career in specialised medicine or research.

She said: “This dynamic course provides a solid foundation to the scientific, practical and clinical aspects of fungal diseases, which allows clinically relevant research like this. In the world of increasing antimicrobial resistance new approaches to the management of infections, sparing the real antibiotics, are highly relevant and important.”

, Professor of Medical Mycology at Swag直播 added: “Honey has been used since ancient times for the treatment of several diseases. Only a limited number of investigations have looked at its effect on pathogenic fungi.

“This opens an exciting door for further work on the application of honey for many fungal infections and allows researchers to adopt different options for treating a range of superficial infections.”