Biologists deliver neutralizing antibodies that protect against HIV infection in mice

ScienceDaily (Nov. 30, 2011) — Over the past year, researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), and around the world, have been studying a group of potent antibodies that have the ability to neutralize HIV in the lab; their hope is that they may learn how to create a vaccine that makes antibodies with similar properties. Now, biologists at Caltech led by Nobel Laureate David Baltimore, president emeritus and Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Biology, have taken one step closer...

Read More

Do bacteria age? Biologists discover the answer follows simple economics

ScienceDaily (Oct. 27, 2011) — When a bacterial cell divides into two daughter cells and those two cells divide into four more daughters, then 8, then 16 and so on, the result, biologists have long assumed, is an eternally youthful population of bacteria. Bacteria, in other words, don't age -- at least not in the same way all other organisms do.But a study conducted by evolutionary biologists at the University of California, San Diego questions that longstanding paradigm. In a paper published in...

Read More

Building better HIV antibodies: Biologists create neutralizing antibody that shows increased potency

ScienceDaily (Oct. 27, 2011) — Using highly potent antibodies isolated from HIV-positive people, researchers have recently begun to identify ways to broadly neutralize the many possible subtypes of HIV. Now, a team led by biologists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has built upon one of these naturally occurring antibodies to create a stronger version they believe is a better candidate for clinical applications.Current advances in isolating antibodies from HIV-infected individuals...

Read More