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Inside her small office, with a window overlooking the iconic Kerckhoff Hall student centre at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), chemical biologist Mireille Kamariza is pursuing her big dream. Since 2015, she has steadily worked to stop transmission of deadly tuberculosis (TB) superbugs, which in 2022 infected more than 10 million people and killed more than one million.

As a PhD student working with Nobel laureate Carolyn Bertozzi, now a chemist at Stanford University in California, she developed a fluorescent diagnostic test that could be used for quick detection of TB, especially in resource-poor settings. In 2019, alongside Bertozzi, Kamariza founded the biotech start-up company OliLux Biosciences, based in Los Angeles, to develop reliable tools for detecting TB that are tailored to the complex needs of poorer countries. Nature sat down with Kamariza to talk about her progress in testing these diagnostic tools for use in the real world, and the uphill battle in fighting the spread of TB.

CD4⁺ T cells have been highlighted in the scientific literature for the important role they play in the immune response to lung infections. However, an article published in the journal Cell Reports shows that an imbalance in the volumes of these defense cells in different parts of the lung in response to infection can do more harm than good.

The study described in the article involved infecting mice with hypervirulent tuberculosis and influenza. The authors concluded that an “ideal amount” of CD4⁺ T cells in the lungs was required for a cure.

This finding opens up perspectives for therapeutic interventions aimed at combating diseases that attack the lungs while not affecting the ability of the adaptive immune system to fight off infection. Even relatively small numbers of CD4⁺ T cells in the lungs proved sufficient to afford protection against tuberculosis, for example.

Tuberculosis can advance rapidly in young children, creating an “urgent situation” after hundreds were potentially exposed at a YMCA day-care facility.

An international research consortium led by Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) has tested a rapid new analytical tool which needs just a blood sample from the fingertip.

About 240,000 children worldwide die of tuberculosis every year. The disease is among the top 10 causes of death in children under the age of 5. One of the main reasons for this mortality is that tuberculosis is often misdiagnosed or not diagnosed in time, particularly in regions with limited resources.

A new diagnostic tool, which an international research consortium led by LMU medical scientists Laura Olbrich and Norbert Heinrich from the Division of Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine at LMU University Hospital Munich has tested as part of a large-scale study in five countries, offers significant progress in this area. The authors report on their findings in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

In 2015, European countries formulated the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which aimed to end TB by 2030. However, in September 2018, global leaders at the first United Nations (UN) General Assembly High-Level Meeting on the Fight Against TB agreed on an ambitious target of eradicating TB by 2022. They strategized that increased access to TB treatment and preventive measures would help achieve their goal quickly. Another measure adopted to progress the TB eradication goal was increasing the funds related to TB research and services.

An uneven progress regarding TB eradication by 2030 was observed in some European regions by the World Health Organization (WHO). Although the majority of Western European countries were on track for TB elimination, Eastern European and Central Asian countries reported a high number of incidences of drug-resistant (DR) TB.

In the European Union/European Economic Area (EU/EEA), TB prevalence is low. Based on the TB surveillance conducted in Europe, out of 30 countries, 24 reported less than 10 TB cases per 100,000 population in 2021. These countries have been encouraged to maintain this low rate and attain the pre-elimination phase of less than 10 TB cases per million population per year. A recent Eurosurveillance journal editorial discussed the progress in the EU/EEA, between 2018 and 2021, towards achieving the 2030 targets for TB elimination.

(TB) is a disease caused by bacteria that attacks the lungs. Skin tests, blood tests, and x-rays can tell if you have TB. Learn more.

GENEVA (AP) — The number of people infected with tuberculosis, including the kind resistant to drugs, rose globally for the first time in years, according to a report Thursday by the World Health Organization.

The U.N. health agency said more than 10 million people worldwide were sickened by tuberculosis in 2021, a 4.5% rise from the year before. About 1.6 million people died, it said. WHO said about 450,000 cases involved people infected with drug-resistant TB, 3% more than in 2020.

Dr. Mel Spigelman, president of the non-profit TB Alliance, said more than a decade of progress was lost when COVID-19 emerged in 2020.

Highlights and Key Developments of the Current Study

In this study, the researchers used the biological synthesis approach to analyze Sargassum polycystum aquatic extract to produce silver seaweed nanoparticles. Various spectroscopic methods, including absorption spectrophotometer (UV-VIS), scanning electron Microscope (SEM), and Fourier transforms infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), were applied to characterize the silver seaweed nanoparticles.

The antibacterial effects of seaweed nanoparticles against several microbial infections, including tuberculosis, were investigated. Zebrafish larvae were used to test the toxicity of the produced silver seaweed nanoparticles.

Tuberculosis (TB) is a potentially serious infectious disease caused by a type of bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The bacteria usually affect the lungs, but also can invade other organs.

In 2018, tuberculosis bacteria infected 1.7 billion people — roughly 23% of the world’s population, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In 2020, the CDC reported 7,174 TB cases and 13 million people living with a latent tuberculosis infection (the germs are in the body but do not cause sickness) in the United States.

Even after successful therapy for tuberculosis, survivors of the disease have an increased risk of recurrent infection and death. A new study published recently by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine found that the cells of humans and animals who have recovered from tuberculosis had prematurely aged up to 12 to 14 years.