Tumors are not a comfortable place to live: oxygen deficiency, nutrient scarcity, and the accumulation of sometimes harmful metabolic products constantly stress cancer cells. A research team from the DKFZ and the IMP in Vienna has now discovered that the acidic pH value in tumor tissue is a decisive factor in how pancreatic cancer cells adapt their energy metabolism in order to survive under these adverse conditions.

Human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are insidious. They can evade the immune defence and antiviral drugs by becoming "latent". In this state, they are largely invisible and unassailable. As long as these dormant viruses persist, there is no cure for HIV/AIDS. However, researchers at Ulm University Hospital have discovered a new way to reactivate latent HI viruses.

Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence CIBSS have demonstrated that an actin scaffold stabilizes the cell nucleus upon mechanical stress. This protective mechanism helps cancer cells to avoid dying during their migration in the body. In the long term, targeted interventions in this mechanism could help to prevent metastases.

Why is blood cancer particularly aggressive in some patients? Researchers at Ulm University Hospital have characterised a mutation in the so-called NOTCH1 gene that significantly influences the prognosis of chronic lymphocytic leukaemia (CLL). Remarkably, this mutation is located in the non-coding region of the gene – an area of DNA long considered less relevant for disease mechanisms.

About five percent of lung adenocarcinomas, one of the most common forms of lung cancer, are driven by a faulty fusion of two genes, EML4 and ALK. This fusion results in different variants, and until now, clinicians have treated all patients with these fusions the same way. However, new research led by scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and Stanford University shows that not all fusion variants behave alike.

Researchers have discovered part of the answer to why some people with obesity or diabetes develop fatty liver disease while others remain healthier. They showed that fat cells have their own protective mechanism that prevents them from dying prematurely under stress. If this mechanism fails, the fat cells disintegrate. This can lead to tissue damage, inflammation and serious metabolic disorders.

The 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded for the development of CRISPR/Cas9, a method also known as “gene scissors”, which enables researchers to better understand how human cells function and stay healthy. Researchers at the University of Stuttgart have further developed CRISPR for this purpose. They present their CRISPRgenee method in Cell Reports Methods.

The cellular environment of a tumor can either support or sabotage recovery. The most comprehensive study to date on the tumor microenvironment in low-grade gliomas, conducted by KiTZ, Jena University Hospital, the DKFZ, and Heidelberg University Hospital, shows what a supportive or obstructive “neighborhood” looks like in childhood brain tumors. The study also provides clues as to how tumor communication might be blocked.

Alumnus Bastian Linder discusses the origin of this start-up and how a tRNA mechanism is helping scientists understand the importance and use of various RNA modifications as they pertain to disease.

Chordomas are rare bone tumors for which there are no effective drugs. A research team from the DKFZ and the NCT Heidelberg has now developed a promising approach: Tailor-made mini-proteins specifically block the driver of tumor development. In the result, slowing the growth of chordoma cells in the laboratory and in a mouse model, while also revealing further molecular vulnerabilities of the tumor that could be addressed with approved drugs.

When embryos grow, cells and tissue are constantly bumping into each other. This creates mechanical tensions that could endanger their development. A team from University of Hohenheim and the Japanese RIKEN Center have discovered that fly embryos have strategies to deal with this pressure. The different species have developed two different solutions. This ability to control mechanical tension could be a key to why so many body plans have evolved.

Researchers from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have collaborated with the SILVACX project group at Heidelberg University to develop a therapeutic vaccination concept that can mobilize the immune system to target cancer cells. The team showed that virus peptides coupled to silica nanoparticles can elicit effective T-cell responses against HPV-related tumors.

The maturation process of oocytes remains paused for several years. Researchers from Konstanz and Göttingen have now found out which protein ensures this state is maintained over such a long period.

A team of scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Netherlands Cancer Institute has discovered a previously unknown vulnerability in cancer cells: When cell division is blocked with chemotherapeutic agents such as Taxol, cancer cells produce small immunogenic peptides that could open up new avenues for immune-based cancer therapies.

A molecular mechanism that contributes to the progression of Alzheimer’s disease has been discovered by a research team of Heidelberg University. The team, using an Alzheimer’s mouse model, demonstrated that a neurotoxic protein-protein complex is responsible for nerve cells in the brain dying off and the resulting cognitive decline. This finding opens up new perspectives for the development of effective treatments.

Until now, the early phase of drug discovery for the development of new therapeutics has been cost- and time-intensive. Researchers at KIT have developed a platform on which extremely miniaturized nanodroplets with a volume of 200 nanoliters per droplet and containing 300 cells per test can be arranged. This platform enables the researchers to synthesize and test thousands of therapeutic agents on the same chip, saving time and resources.

Researchers at the University of Freiburg, together with partners, have uncovered the mechanism of ultrafast transport by calcium pumps in nerve cells. These pumps, complexes of PMCA2 and neuroplastin proteins, operate at more than 5,000 cycles per second and terminate calcium signals within milliseconds – 100 times faster than previously known. They play a crucial role in rapid information processing in the brain.

Every brain tumor is made up of cells in successive stages of activation. Researchers have now analyzed the individual structure of these activation pyramids in malignant brain tumors. In doing so, they discovered a signaling protein that slows down the transition from a dormant to an activated state by epigenetically reprogramming the cells. The hope is that this will permanently freeze cancer cells in a dormant state and thus halt tumor growth.

The targeted engineering of artificial proteins with unique properties – that is possible with the assistance of a novel method developed by a research team of Heidelberg University. It centers around a new AI model. This allows for forecasting how two proteins have to be fitted together at the molecular level from individual parts – subunits – in order to engineer a functional, adjustable new protein.

FOXP1 syndrome is a congenital disorder in which the brain development of affected children is severely impaired due to a genetic variant. A research team from the Medical Faculty Heidelberg at Heidelberg University has now demonstrated in mice, that the inhibition of a specific enzyme in the brain can improve abnormal behavior and immune cell dysfunction in the brain. The results have been published in the journal Advanced Science.

Designing protein binders from scratch has long been a daunting challenge within the field of computational biology. Researchers have now developed an innovative, training-free pipeline that uses the fundamental principle of shape complementarity to design site-specific protein binders, which are then optimised to fit precisely onto chosen target sites. The researchers tested this on proteins linked to cancer.

Konstanz researchers identify an enzyme that plays a role in the migration of cells in our body - not only during normal tissue formation and wound healing, but also when tumor cells metastasize. This makes the enzyme an interesting candidate for potential future therapeutic approaches.

A team of researchers from HITS and MPIP have developed a model that learns how to generate proteins whose structures are highly flexible, even with patterns that are uncommon in natural proteins. Their work, presented at the International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML), marks a step towards the goal of designing new proteins for applications in biotechnology, therapeutics and environmental research.

ngredients of our daily diet – including caffeine – can influence the resistance of bacteria to antibiotics. This has been shown in a new study by a team of researchers at the Universities of Tübingen and Würzburg. They discovered bacteria such as E. coli orchestrate complex regulatory cascades to react to chemical stimuli from their direct environment which can influence the effectiveness of antimicrobial drugs.

Many people with cancer experience dramatic loss of muscle and fat tissue. In many cases, even the heart muscle is affected. This wasting syndrome, affects around half of all cancer patients. Researchers from Helmholtz Munich, in collaboration with Heidelberg University Hospital, the Technical University of Munich, and the German Center for Diabetes Research, have now identified a previously overlooked driver of cachexia: the liver.