Taking inspiration from a rare mutation that makes people impervious to viral diseases, a Columbia researcher is developing a therapy that could bestow this superpower on the rest of us. 

Threadworms spend up to 10 minutes exploring human skin before finding the best place to burrow in.  When a specific dopamine signal is blocked, the worms almost completely stop trying to penetrate the skin. A topical application that blocks this dopamine pathway could act as a repellent to prevent threadworm infections.

A National Institutes of Health (NIH)-supported clinical trial has found that the outcome of treating complicated Staphylococcus aureus bloodstream infections with two intravenous (IV) doses of the antibiotic dalbavancin seven days apart is just as good as daily IV doses of conventional antibiotics over four to six weeks. Nearly 120,000 S. aureus bloodstream infections and 20,000 associated deaths occurred in the United States in 2017. The study results provide the clearest evidence to date for the safety and effectiveness of dalbavancin therapy for complicated S. aureus bloodstream infections, expanding the number of antimicrobial treatment options for clinicians and patients.