Publications by authors named "Nidia Cabral-Hipolito"

Background: An antigen is a small foreign substance, such as a microorganism structural protein, that may trigger an immune response once inside the body. Antigens are preferentially used rather than completely attenuated microorganisms to develop safe vaccines. Unfortunately, not all antigens are able to induce an immune response.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Immunization or vaccination is the process of inducing artificial immunity against an antigen taking advantage of the mechanisms of immunological memory. Current vaccines include substances known as adjuvants, which tend to improve the immunogenicity of the antigen, reduce the antigen quantity employed, and boost the immune response in weak responders. Unfortunately, only a few vaccine adjuvants are approved for human use.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic had infected more than 3.5M people around the world and more than 250K people died in 187 countries by May 2020. The causal agent of this disease is a coronavirus whose onset of symptoms to death range from 6 to 41 days with a median of 14 days.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Pathogens use multiple mechanisms to disrupt cell functioning in their host and allow pathogenesis. These mechanisms involve communication between the pathogen and the host cell through protein-protein interactions.

Methods: Protein-protein interactions chains referred to as signal transduction pathways are the processes by which a chemical or physical signal transmits through a cell as series of molecular events so the pathogen needs to intercept these molecular pathways at few positions to induce pathogenesis such as pathogen viability, infection or hypersensitivity.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF