An autoimmune condition makes certain people much more susceptible to West Nile virus and many other severe viral diseases. In the future, a screening process could reveal if you’re at risk.
The study explains why treatments for many autoimmune and inflammatory diseases raise the risk of contracting TB—and also upends long-held assumptions about what kicks off an immune response.
New findings describe how the enzyme CST is recruited to the end of the telomere, where it maintains telomere length with the help of subtle chemical changes made to the protein POT1.
The end replication problem dictates that telomeres shrink unless telomerase intervenes. But the problem is actually twice as complicated, with telomerase providing only part of the solution.