Influenza viruses, long known as harmful human pathogens, are now being reengineered into safe and powerful therapeutic tools. A new article in Engineering introduces a controllable PTC influenza platform using non-canonical amino acids to limit viral replication while boosting immune protection. This versatile system works as a next-generation vaccine against flu and other infections and shows strong potential as a cancer immunotherapy tool, opening new paths for future infectious disease and cancer treatments.

Gallbladder cancer (GBC) is an extremely aggressive biliary tract malignancy characterized by silent early progression, late-stage diagnosis and poor prognosis. It is one of the most lethal gastrointestinal cancers, with a five-year survival rate often below 10%, partly because only about 10-20% of patients are eligible for curative surgical resection at diagnosis. 

A key focus of molecular research is whether Actionable Genomic Alterations (AGAs) – specific DNA changes in cancer cells – independently impact survival beyond established factors like stage and treatment.

A new study by researchers at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine has found that patients with gallbladder cancer who had certain documented gene changes in their tumor had a higher risk of death, even when we compared them with similar patients based on age, sex, race/ethnicity, cancer stage, surgery and chemotherapy.