Penn State researchers will use $2.8 million in funding from the National Institutes of Health’s Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease to develop new tools to investigate the genetics underpinning the relationships between mosquitoes and various microbes.

Patients with deficient DNA mismatch repair (dMMR) or microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) metastatic colorectal cancer experienced a 58% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death when treated with atezolizumab (Tecentriq®) plus modified FOLFOX6 and bevacizumab (Avastin®) compared with atezolizumab alone, according to results from the NRG-GI004/SWOG S1610 COMMIT trial published recently in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The combination also produced higher response rates and substantially reduced primary disease progression.

Biophysicists unraveled a mystery about muscles that may help in the design of treatments for muscle diseases such as dilated cardiomyopathy, one of the leading causes of heart failure.

A new high-risk, high-reward NIAID grant to UMBC chemist Herana Kamal Seneviratne aims to strengthen HIV prevention by explaining why PrEP protects some people more effectively than others. Building on his group’s prior research into the negative side effects of HIV drugs—especially on the brain—the project will examine how the key PrEP medications tenofovir and emtricitabine are activated in colon tissue, a critical site for transmission. The findings could support better dosing and more consistent protection.