A pilot surveillance report of SARS-CoV-2 rapid antigen test results among volunteers in Germany, 1st week of July 2022.

Purpose: We hypothesized that SARS-CoV-2 infection numbers reported by governmental institutions are underestimated due to high dark figures as only results from polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests are incorporated in governmental statistics and testing capacities were further restricted as of July, 2022.

Methods: A point prevalence investigation was piloted by rapid antigen testing (RAT) among participants of the VACCELERATE volunteer registry. 2400 volunteers were contacted, of which 500 received a RAT including instructions for self-testing in the first week of July, 2022.

The macrophage-TCRαβ is a cholesterol-responsive combinatorial immune receptor and implicated in atherosclerosis.

Recent evidence indicates constitutive expression of a recombinatorial TCRαβ immune receptor in mammalian monocytes and macrophages. Here, we demonstrate in vitro that macrophage-TCRβ repertoires are modulated by atherogenic low density cholesterol (LDL) and high-density cholesterol (HDL). In vivo, analysis of freshly obtained artery specimens from patients with severe carotid atherosclerosis reveals massive abundance of TCRαβ(+) macrophages within the atherosclerotic lesions.

A second combinatorial immune receptor in monocytes/macrophages is based on the TCRγδ.

Recent evidence indicates that monocytes and macrophages express T cell receptor (TCR)αβ-like combinatorial immune receptors. Here, we demonstrate the presence of a second recombinatorial immunoreceptor, which is structurally based on the TCR γ- and δ-chains, in human and murine monocytes and differentially activated macrophages (referred to here as TCRL(m)γδ). In vitro, infection of macrophages with mycobacteria and gram positive or gram negative bacteria induced expression of donor-specific and differential TCRL(m)Vδ repertoires indicating that the novel immunoreceptor represents a dynamic flexible host defense system that responds to bacterial challenge.

Identification of a new prostate-specific cyclic peptide with the bacterial FliTrx system.

Unlabelled: Peptides are useful tools for directing radioisotopes into tumors. We evaluated the ability of a bacterial peptide display system to isolate new prostate tumor-specific peptides.

Methods: We used the bacterial FliTrx system to identify a new cyclic peptide that binds to prostate carcinoma.