Press releases archive 鈥� June 2020
Jun
10
2020
18:46
Frankfurt researchers use ecological niche modelling to project the distribution of Chagas disease vectors聽
Kissing bugs also find suitable climatic conditions in Europe
FRANKFURT. An infection with Chagas disease is only
possible in Latin America since the insect species that spread the disease only
occur there. Scientists at 51猎奇 and the Senckenberg Society for
Natural Research have now used ecological niche models to calculate the extent
to which habitats outside of the Americas may also be suitable for the bugs.
The result: climatically suitable conditions can be found in southern Europe
for two kissing bug species; along the coasts of Africa and Southeast Asia the
conditions are suitable for yet another species. The Frankfurt scientists therefore
call for careful monitoring of the current distribution of triatomine bugs.
(eLife DOI: 10.7554/eLife.52072)
The acute phase of the tropical Chagas disease
(American Trypanosomiasis) is usually symptom-free: only in every third case
does the infecting parasite (Trypanosoma
cruzi) cause any symptoms at all, and these are often unspecific, such as
fever, hives and swollen lymph glands. But the parasites remain in the
body, and many years later chronic
Chagas disease can become life-threatening with pathological enlargement of the
heart and progressive paralysis of the gastrointestinal tract. There is no
vaccine for Chagas disease. The WHO estimates that 6 to 7 million people are
infected worldwide, with the majority living in Latin America (about 4.6
million), followed by the USA with more than 300,000 and Europe with approximately
80,000 infected people.
Chagas parasites are transmitted by
predatory blood-sucking bugs that ingest the pathogen along with the blood. After a
development period in the intestinal tract of the bugs, the parasites are shed
in the bug's faeces. The highly infectious faeces are unintentionally rubbed
into the wound by the extreme itching caused by the bug bite. Oral transmission
by eating food contaminated with triatomine
bug faeces is also possible.
Researchers led by the Frankfurt
parasitologists and infection biologists Fanny Eberhard and Professor Sven
Klimpel have used niche models to investigate which climatic conditions in the
world are suitable for Latin American kissing bugs. In particular, temperature
and precipitation patterns were incorporated into the calculations on the
climatic suitability of a region. The researchers were able to show that currently
in addition to Latin America, Central Africa and Southeast Asia also have
suitable habitats for triatomines. Two of the triatomine species, Triatoma sordida and Triatoma infestans, are now finding
suitable habitats in temperate regions of southern Europe such as Portugal,
Spain, France and Italy. Both triatomine species frequently transmit the
dangerous parasites in Latin America and can be found inside or near houses and
stables, where they get their nightly blood meals preferably from dogs,
chickens and humans.
Another triatomine species, Triatoma rubrofasciata, has already been
detected outside Latin America. The model calculations by the Frankfurt
scientists identify suitable habitats along large areas of the African and
Southeast Asian coasts.
Professor Sven Kimpel explains: 鈥淭here are
people living in Europe who were infected with Chagas in Latin America and are unknowingly
carriers of Trypanosoma cruzi. However, the parasite can
currently only be transmitted to other people through untested blood preservations
or by a mother to her unborn child. Otherwise, Trypanosoma cruzi
requires triatomine bugs as intermediate hosts. And these bugs are increasingly
finding suitable climatic conditions outside Latin America. Based on our data,
monitoring programmes on the distribution and spreading of triatomine bugs would therefore be feasible. Mandatory
reporting of Chagas disease cases could also be helpful."
Publication: Fanny E. Eberhard, Sarah
Cunze, Judith Kochmann, Sven Klimpel. Modelling the
climatic suitability of Chagas disease vectors on a global scale. eLife
2020;9:e52072 doi: 10.7554/eLife.52072,
An image may be downloaded here:
Caption:
The triatomine or 鈥渒issing" bug Triatoma infestans. Credit: Dorian D.
D枚rge for 51猎奇 Frankfurt
Further information:
Prof.
Dr. Sven Klimpel
Institute for Ecology, Evolution and
Diversity, 51猎奇
& Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate
Research Centre
Tel.
+49 69 798 42237
E-Mail:
Klimpel@bio.uni-frankfurt.de
Jun
9
2020
15:54
66 million euros to generate open-access chemical tools聽
New consortium EUbOPEN will provide tools to unlock disease biology
Frankfurt and Ingelheim. Almost twenty years after deciphering the human genome, our
understanding of human disease is still far from complete. One of the most powerful
and versatile tools to better understand biology and disease-relevant processes
is the use of well-characterized small chemical modulators of protein function.
The new EUbOPEN consortium aims to develop high quality chemical tool compounds
for 1,000 proteins (one third of the druggable proteins in the human body). It
will enable unencumbered access to these research tools, thereby empowering
academia and industry alike to explore disease biology and unlock the discovery
of new drug targets and treatments.
The EUbOPEN consortium comprises 22 different partner
organizations, including universities, research institutes,
European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA)
members, and one small and medium-sized enterprise (SME). Goethe
University Frankfurt and Boehringer Ingelheim are jointly leading the EUbOPEN
consortium.
Other partner organizations are Bayer AG, Diamond Light Source, EMBL-EBI,
ETH Z眉rich, Fraunhofer IME, Georg-Speyer-Haus, Karolinska Institutet, Leiden University Medical Center, McGill
University, Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, Pfizer, Royal Institute of
Technology, Servier, the Structural Genomics Consortium, Takeda, University of
Dundee, University of North Carolina, University of Oxford, and University of
Toronto.
To interfere with the function of a protein in any given cell type, scientists need small chemical tools that affect the studied protein as specifically as possible, thereby avoiding unintended effects on other proteins. Therefore, there is an urgent need for selective and well-characterized chemical modulators for basic and applied research. Ideally, such tools would be available for every human protein. Moreover, these chemical modulators should be available to all researchers without restrictions on use, thus providing scientists with tools to better understand understudied proteins, thereby discovering possible links to disease.
The generation and dissemination of such high-quality and well-characterized research tools for a substantial fraction of the druggable human genome are the major goals of the newly formed public-private partnership 鈥淓nabling and Unlocking biology in the OPEN" (EUbOPEN). This large consortium was launched on 1 May 2020, with a total budget of 65.8 million euros covered by a grant from the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) and cash/in-kind contributions from EFPIA companies and IMI Associated Partners and contributions from partners outside of Europe.
'EUbOPEN will provide the wider academic community with unencumbered
access to the highest quality pharmacological tool compounds for a large number
of novel targets, and seed a massive community target prioritization and
deconvolution effort. The expected impact should be transformative', says
Project Leader Adrian J. Carter, Boehringer Ingelheim.
'By the end of the project, we will have
created the largest and most deeply characterised collection of chemical
modulators of protein function that is openly available. The chemical tool sets
and associated data will be a tremendous resource for academic science leading
to the discovery of new biology and of novel disease modulating targets for the
development of new medicines', adds Coordinator
Stefan Knapp, 51猎奇 Frankfurt.
EUbOPEN will develop these compounds using
new technologies and test them in well-characterized, disease-relevant human tissue
assays in the areas of immunology, oncology and neuroscience. The project
outputs, including chemogenomic library sets, chemical probes, assay protocols
and associated research data will be made openly available to the research
community without restriction.
The EUbOPEN project will form the foundation for future global efforts to generate chemical modulators for the entire druggable proteome and the developed new technologies will significantly shorten the lead optimization processes. The sustainability of the resources the project will be ensured through many partnerships for example with chemical vendors and biotech companies as well as online database providers. Internet:
Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI)
The is Europe's largest public-private
initiative aiming to speed up the development of better and safer medicines for
patients. IMI supports collaborative research projects and builds networks of
industrial and academic experts in order to boost pharmaceutical innovation in
Europe. IMI is a joint undertaking between the European Union and the European
Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA).
For further details please visit:
Further information:
Goethe-University Frankfurt:
Prof. Dr. Stefan Knapp
EUbOPEN Project Coordinator
51猎奇 Frankfurt
knapp@pharmchem.uni-frankfurt.de
Dr. Markus
Bernards
Science
Communications
P +49 (69)
798 12498
bernards@em.uni-frankfurt.de
Boehringer
Ingelheim:
Dr. Adrian Carter
EUbOPEN Project Leader
Boehringer Ingelheim
adrian.carter@boehringer-ingelheim.com
Dr. Reinhard
Malin
Head of Communications Innovation Unit
P: + 9 (6132) 77 90815
reinhard.malin@boehringer-ingelheim.com
Jun
9
2020
12:35
New experimental technique with 51猎奇鈥檚 reaction microscope allows 鈥淴-ray鈥� of individual molecules
Snapshot of exploding oxygen
FRANKFURT. For
more than 100 years, we have been using X-rays to look inside matter, and progressing
to ever smaller structures 鈥� from crystals to nanoparticles. Now, within the
framework of a larger international collaboration on the X-ray laser European XFEL in Schenefeld near Hamburg, physicists at 51猎奇 have
achieved a qualitative leap forward: using a new experimental technique, they
have been able to 鈥淴-ray" molecules such as oxygen and view their motion in the
microcosm for the first time.
鈥淭he smaller the particle, the bigger the
hammer." This rule from particle physics, which looks inside the interior of
atomic nuclei using gigantic accelerators, also applies to this research. In
order to 鈥淴-ray" a two-atom molecule such as oxygen, an extremely powerful and
ultra-short X-ray pulse is required. This was provided by the European XFEL
which started operations in 2017 and is one of the the strongest X-ray source
in the world
In order to expose individual molecules, a
new X-ray technique is also needed: with the aid of the extremely powerful
laser pulse the molecule is quickly robbed of two firmly bound electrons. This
leads to the creation of two positively charged ions that fly apart from each
other abruptly due to the electrical repulsion. Simultaneously, the fact that
electrons also behave like waves is used to advantage. 鈥淵ou can think of it
like a sonar," explains project manager Professor Till Jahnke from the Institute
for Nuclear Physics. 鈥淭he electron wave is scattered by the molecular structure
during the explosion, and we recorded the resulting diffraction pattern. We
were therefore able to essentially X-ray the molecule from within, and observe
it in several steps during its break-up."
For this technique, known as 鈥渆lectron
diffraction imaging", physicists at the Institute for Nuclear Physics spent
several years further developing the COLTRIMS technique, which was conceived
there (and is often referred to as a 鈥渞eaction microscope"). Under the
supervision of Dr Markus Sch枚ffler, a corresponding apparatus was modified for
the requirements of the European XFEL in advance, and designed and realised in
the course of a doctoral thesis by Gregor Kastirke. No simple task, as Till
Jahnke observes: 鈥淚f I had to design a spaceship in order to safely fly to the
moon and back, I would definitely want Gregor in my team. I am very impressed
by what he accomplished here."
The result, which was published in the
current issue of the renowned Physical Review X, provides the first evidence that
this experimental method works. In the future, photochemical reactions of individual
molecules can be studied using these images with their high temporal resolution.
For example, it should be possible to observe the reaction of a medium-sized
molecule to UV rays in real time. In addition, these are the first measurement
results to be published since the start of operations of the Small Quantum
Systems (SQS) experiment station at the European XFEL at the end of 2018.
Publication:
Photoelectron diffraction imaging of a
molecular breakup using an X-ray free-electron laser. Gregor
Kastirke et al. Phys. Rev. X 10, 021052
Images
may be downloaded at this link:
Caption:
During the explosion of an oxygen molecule:
the X-ray laser XFEL knocks electrons out of the two atoms of the oxygen
molecule and initiates its breakup. During the fragmentation, the X-ray laser
releases another electron out of an inner shell from one of the two oxygen
atoms that are now charged (ions). The electron has particle and wave
characteristics, and the waves are scattered by the other oxygen ion. The
diffraction pattern are used to image the breakup of the oxygen molecules and
to take snapshots of the fragmentation process (electron diffraction imaging).
Credit: Till Jahnke, 51猎奇 Frankfurt
Further
information:
Professor Till Jahnke
Institute for Nuclear Physics
51猎奇 Frankfurt
Tel.: +49 69 798-47025
E-Mail: jahnke@atom.uni-frankfurt.de.
For European XFEL und SQS:
Dr. Michael Meyer
Holzkoppel 4
22689 Schenefeld
Tel.: 040 8998 5614
E-Mail: michael.meyer@xfel.eu
Jun
9
2020
12:28
Frankfurt neuroscientists: Both hemispheres of the brain make a unique contribution to speech control 鈥� new research casts doubt on current doctrine
How the brain controls our speech
FRANKFURT. Speaking requires both sides of the
brain. Each hemisphere takes over a part of the complex task of forming sounds,
modulating the voice and monitoring what has been said. However, the
distribution of tasks is different than has been thought up to now, as an
interdisciplinary team of neuroscientists and phoneticians at 51猎奇
Frankfurt and the Leibniz-Centre General Linguistics Berlin has discovered: it
is not just the right hemisphere that analyses how we speak 鈥� the left
hemisphere also plays a role.
Until now, it has been assumed that the spoken word arises in left side of the brain and is analysed by the right side. According to accepted doctrine, this means that when we learn to speak English and for example practice the sound equivalent to 鈥渢h", the left side of the brain controls the motor function of the articulators like the tongue, while the right side analyses whether the produced sound actually sounds as we intended.
The division of labour actually follows
different principles, as Dr Christian Kell from the Department of Neurology at
51猎奇 explains: 鈥淲hile the left side of the brain controls temporal
aspects such as the transition between speech sounds, the right hemisphere is
responsible for the control of the sound spectrum. When you say 'mother', for
example, the left hemisphere primarily controls the dynamic transitions between
鈥渢h" and the vowels, while the right hemisphere primarily controls the sounds themselves."
His team, together with the phonetician Dr Susanne Fuchs, was able to
demonstrate this division of labour in temporal and spectral control of speech
for the first time in studies in which speakers were required to talk while
their brain activities were recorded using functional magnetic resonance
imaging.
A possible explanation for this division
of labour between the two sides of the brain is that the left hemisphere
generally analyses fast processes such as the transition between speech sounds
better than the right hemisphere. The right hemisphere could be better at
controlling the slower processes required for analysing the sound spectrum. A
previous study on hand motor function that was published in the scientific
publication 鈥渆life" demonstrates that this is in fact the case. Kell and his
team wanted to learn why the right hand was preferentially used for the control
of fast actions and the left hand preferred for slow actions. For example, when
cutting bread, the right hand is used to slice with the knife while the left hand
holds the bread.
In the experiment, scientists had
right-handed test persons tap with both hands to the rhythm of a metronome. In
one version they were supposed to tap with each beat, and in another only with
every fourth beat. As it turned out, the right hand was more precise during the
quick tapping sequence and the left hemisphere, which controls the right side
of the body, exhibited increased activity. Conversely, tapping with the left
hand corresponded better with the slower rhythm and resulted in the right
hemisphere exhibiting increased activity.
Taken together, the two studies create a
convincing picture of how complex behaviour 鈥� hand motor functions and speech 鈥�
are controlled by both cerebral hemispheres. The left side of the brain has a
preference for the control of fast processes while the right side tends to
control the slower processes in parallel.
Publications:
Floegel M, Fuchs S, Kell CA (2020)
Differential contributions of the two cerebral hemispheres to temporal and
spectral speech feedback control. Nature Communications, 11:2839.
Pflug A, Gompf F, Muthuraman M, Groppa S,
Kell CA (2019) Differential contributions of the two human cerebral hemispheres
to action timing. eLife, 8:48404
Further information: Dr. Christian Kell, Cognitive Neuroscience Group, Clinic for Neurology, 51猎奇 Frankfurt/ University Hospital Frankfurt, Tel.: +49 69 6301-6395, E-mail: c.kell@em.uni-frankfurt.de