Bivalent Omicron BA.1 vaccine booster increases memory B cell breadth and neutralising antibodies against emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Background: Current literature informs us that bivalent vaccines will generate a broader serum neutralizing antibody response to multiple SARS-CoV-2 variants, but studies on how this breadth relates to the memory B cell (MBC) and T cell responses are sparse. This study compared breadth of neutralising antibody, and memory B and T cell responses to monovalent or a bivalent ancestral/Omicron BA.1 COVID-19 booster vaccine.

Next-Generation Sequencing Methods for Near-Real-Time Molecular Epidemiology of HIV and HCV.

The World Health Organisation has set targets of reducing the transmission of new hepatitis C (HCV) infections by 90%, and ending human immunodeficiency virus-1 (HIV) as a public health threat, by 2030. To achieve this, efficient and timely viral surveillance, and effective public health interventions, are required. Traditional epidemiological methods are largely dependent on the recognition of incident cases with symptomatic illness; acute HIV and HCV infections are commonly asymptomatic, which may lead to delays in the recognition of such new infections.

Rationale and Design of SCOT-HEART 2 Trial: CT Angiography for the Prevention of Myocardial Infarction.

Coronary artery disease continues to be the leading cause of death globally. Identifying patients who are at risk of coronary artery disease remains a public health priority. At present, the focus of cardiovascular disease prevention relies heavily on probabilistic risk scoring despite no randomized controlled trials demonstrating their efficacy.

Discovery of a monoclonal, high-affinity CD8 T-cell clone following natural hepatitis C virus infection.

CD8 T cells recognizing their cognate antigen are typically recruited as a polyclonal population consisting of multiple clonotypes with varying T-cell receptor (TCR) affinity to the target peptide-major histocompatibility complex (pMHC) complex. Advances in single-cell sequencing have increased accessibility toward identifying TCRs with matched antigens. Here we present the discovery of a monoclonal CD8 T-cell population with specificity for a hepatitis C virus (HCV)-derived human leukocyte antigen (HLA) class I epitope (HLA-B*07:02 GPRLGVRAT) which was isolated directly ex vivo from an individual with an episode of acutely resolved HCV infection.

The development of number line estimation in children at risk of mathematics learning difficulties: A longitudinal study.

Children with mathematics learning difficulties (MLD) show poorer performance on the number line task, but how performance on this task relates to other mathematical skills is unclear. This study examined the association between performance on the number line task and mathematical skills during the first 2 years of school for children at risk of MLD. Children (N = 100; M = 83.