Volume 26 Issue 7, 1 July 2020

As cases of COVID-19 are being declared the Global South, low- and middle-income countries brace themselves for the pandemic.

Matthias Trost is a biochemist and mass spectrometrist working at Newcastle University. He is currently leading the university’s effort in supporting the National Health Service with COVID-19 screening.

Reuse of patient data for research purposes could be very fruitful. However, too seldom are those whom the data are from—the patients—involved in how their data should be used.

Africa is said to be the next possible hotspot for COVID-19. However, we believe this is still preventable.

Given the current trends in incidence and underlying healthcare systems vulnerabilities, Africa could become the next epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. As the pandemic transitions to more widespread community transmission, how can the lessons learned thus far be consolidated to effectively curb the spread of COVID-19 while minimizing social disruption and negative humanitarian and economic consequences?

COVID-19 has disrupted scientific productivity in unquantifiable ways. Unquestionably, the biggest disruption has been felt by junior faculty. However, these bright young minds do not have to be sacrificed.

Many actors in the response to COVID-19 are holding out for a vaccine to be developed. But in the meantime, tried and tested public-health measures for controlling outbreaks can be implemented. A scorecard can be used to assess governments’ responses to the outbreak.

A simple blood test performed alongside PET-CT imaging facilitates early cancer detection in asymptomatic women.

Data routinely collected in the emergency department after trauma have the potential to predict those at risk of later PTSD, which shows promise for computational psychiatry.

An analysis of the microbiomes of the Irish Traveller community, which has recently undergone enforced lifestyle changes, increases understanding of the environmental factors that shape the gut microbiome.

Injured human donor lungs deemed unsuitable for immediate transplantation may be successfully recovered by connection into the circulation of a porcine host with perfusion and ventilation ex vivo for 24 hours.

Recent clinical observations have prompted clinicians to think of COVID-19 as being more than a respiratory disease.

Development of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay to detect antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein in human sera and plasma.

Analysis of data from a smartphone-based app designed for large-scale tracking of potential COVID-19 symptoms, used by over 2.5 million participants in the United Kingdom and United States, shows that loss of taste and smell sensations is predictive of potential SARS-CoV-2 infection.

A cell-free DNA-methylation sequencing assay accurately identifies renal cell carcinoma using plasma and urine samples.

A cell-free DNA-methylation sequencing assay accurately identifies different brain tumor types using plasma samples.

Heritable APOE variants in patients with melanoma influence anti-tumor immunity and modulate metastatic progression and response to immunotherapy.

Multiregion spatial histology, exome and transcriptome data from patients with non-small cell lung cancer suggest that cancer subclones from immune cold regions diversify later than subclones from immune hot regions

Identification of a DNA-damage signature induced by colibactin, a toxin expressed by some strains of Escherichia coli, is enriched in human colorectal cancers.

Single-cell transcriptomic analysis identifies changes in peripheral immune cells in seven hospitalized patients with COVID-19, including HLA class II downregulation, a heterogeneous interferon-stimulated gene signature and low pro-inflammatory cytokine gene expression in monocytes and lymphocytes.

Bat and human intestinal organoids can support replication of SARS-CoV-2, enabling further characterization of the virus lifecycle and investigation of potential mechanisms of enteric infection in COVID-19.

A machine-learning algorithm using electronic medical records and self-reported measures of stress at admission to the emergency department due to trauma can predict the risk and long-term trajectories of post-traumatic stress disorder in two independent cohorts.

The gut microbiomes of Irish Travellers, an ethnically distinct subpopulation of Ireland, have similarity to the microbiomes of non-industrialized populations, but externally imposed lifestyle changes may alter their microbiota, with potential health sequelae.

An IgG-cleaving endopeptidase can degrade circulating anti-adeno-associated virus antibodies in mice and nonhuman primates in vivo, as well as in human plasma in vitro, offering a potential solution for a major hurdle in gene therapy.

In a new strategy for increasing the availability of lungs for transplantation, human lungs declined for transplantation because of their poor quality can be recuperated by connecting them to the circulation of a pig.

A new approach for whole-genome sequencing of plasma circulating tumor DNA allows for dynamic monitoring of disease burden and ultra-sensitive detection of minimal residual disease.

Primary tumor presence and progression shape the systemic immune landscape and immune responses to pathogens in multiple murine tumor models.

Characterization of 200 antibodies that bind a malaria parasite protein provides insights that could enable better vaccine design.