Since almost the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the scientific community has tried to determine why this virus causes such negative long-term effects compared to those created by most others. coronavirus.

The investigation begins to give some answers. Among them, the one that appears published in Science Translational Medicine and that suggests new approaches to treat covid-19, according to the research team formed by a multicenter consortium led from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, United States (CHOP) and the Covid-19. 19 International Research Team (VOC-IRT).

This scientific platform has discovered that genes in mitochondria, the energy producers of our cells, can be negatively affected by the virus, leading to dysfunction in multiple organs beyond the lungs.

Mitochondria are found in every cell in our body.. The genes responsible for generating mitochondria are scattered both in the nuclear DNA located in the nucleus of our cells and in the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) located within each mitochondria.

Previous studies have shown that SARS-CoV-2 proteins can bind to mitochondrial proteins in host cells, potentially leading to mitochondrial dysfunction.

To understand how SARS-CoV-2 affects mitochondria, researchers at CHOP's Center for Mitochondrial and Epigenomic Medicine (CMEM), together with colleagues at COV-IRT, analyzed mitochondrial gene expression to detect differences caused by the mitochondria. virus. To do this, they analyzed a combination of nasopharyngeal and autopsy tissues from affected patients and animal models.

Recovered in the lungs, not in other organs

Joseph Guarnieri, MCEH postdoctoral researcher at CHOP notes that tissue samples from human patients allowed us to see how mitochondrial gene expression was affected “at the beginning and end of disease progression, whereas animal models allowed us to complete the blank spaces and look at the progression of differences in gene expression over time.

The study found that, in autopsy tissue, mitochondrial gene expression had recovered in the lungs, but mitochondrial function remained suppressed in the heart, as well as in the kidneys and liver.

By studying animal models and measuring the time when the viral load peaked in the lungs, mitochondrial gene expression was suppressed in the cerebellum, although SARS-CoV-2 was not observed in the brain.. Additional animal models revealed that during the middle phase of SARS-CoV-2 infection, mitochondrial function in the lungs began to recover.

Taken together, these results reveal that host cells respond to initial infection in a way that involves the lungs, but over time, mitochondrial function in the lungs is restored, while in other organs, particularly the heart, mitochondrial function is restored. mitochondrial function remains impaired.

For Douglas C.. Wallace, Director of CMEM at CHOP, this study provides strong evidence that COVID-19 needs to move away from viewing it strictly as an upper respiratory disease and start viewing it as a systemic disorder affecting multiple organs.”

Potential therapeutic target

“The ongoing dysfunction that we are seeing in organs other than the lungs suggests that mitochondrial dysfunction could be causing long-term damage to the internal organs of these patients.”

While future studies using these data will explore how systemic immune and inflammatory responses may be responsible for more severe disease in some patients, the research team found a potential therapeutic target in microRNA 2392 (miR-2392), which they demonstrated regulate mitochondrial function in the human tissue samples used in this study.

“This microRNA was upregulated in the blood of patients infected with SARS-CoV-2, which is not something we would normally expect to see,” says co-lead author Afshin Beheshti, a biostatistician and visiting researcher at The Broad Institute in Cambridge. , and founder and president of COV-IRT.

In his opinion, “neutralizing this microRNA could prevent the replication of the virus, providing an additional therapeutic option for patients who are at risk of suffering more serious complications related to the disease.”

Earlier this year, the Gates Foundation provided funding to Douglas C. Wallace and MEMC to investigate how mtDNA variation between global populations could affect mitochondrial function and therefore individual susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2.

According to Wallace, the demonstration that SARS-CoV-2 markedly affects mitochondrial function “supports the hypothesis that individual differences in mitochondrial function could be a factor in the individual severity of covid-19.”

Cristina Porta has a multi-allergic 4-year-old son, Artai. In a month she is preparing to travel with her other 7-year-old daughter and her partner to the United Kingdom, specifically, to London. She is afraid, afraid because her son is allergic to eggs, milk, gluten, and a protein called LTP, which is found in the plant world, in the skin and shell of foods such as fruits, nuts, seeds, legumes, cereals and vegetables. Traveling is a challenge for this family, but fear does not stop them because they have learned to live with it on a daily basis.

They have been preparing the trip for a year. “From the first moment you leave an Allergology consultation with a diagnosis of food allergy, improvisation is over for the rest of your days”. It is very important to have everything tied up, “although zero risk does not exist,” he acknowledges.

He took the flights with enough time to be able to notify the airline of his son's conditions. There are three types of allergic reactions: by ingestion, by inhalation or by contact. In his case, so far, Artai has no inhalation reaction.. Cristina and her family will enter the plane before the rest of the passengers, to be able to clean the seat and everything that is within the little one's reach, since by contact with food they can have an allergic reaction, and “you never know what has eaten the person who was before”. Cristina explains that planes are cleaned at night, but not between flights, and for this reason they must make sure everything is sanitized.

Artai also has severe asthma.. “I've had the apartment for nine months because I had to get one that didn't have a carpet, and that's not easy in London”. Not only that it does not have a carpet, but that it has a pharmacy and hospital nearby. In addition, Cristina checks a suitcase with only food suitable for him and checks the supermarkets that are close at hand to find out if he can find cold products free of allergens.. He has also taken out travel insurance, and not everyone is worth it: “Some do not include food allergies.”

In social networks he vents by writing. “At 4.30 I am overwhelmed thinking about how much I have left to organize this last month. At 7:00, I reflect on last weekend's minor coughing crisis over a simple rug and what that would mean in an airplane cabin.. At 12.00, I receive an email with the medical report in English from your allergist that allows you to carry adrenaline and summarizes your allergic condition. I relax. At 3:00 p.m. I have decided to take the Thermomix with me. At 3:30 p.m. I find myself debating with Artai that it might be time to leave her comfort zone and leave without her.. At 7:00 p.m. I tell my husband how much time we are going to waste in British supermarkets checking labels. And at 8:00 p.m. while I have dinner, I propose that as long as I don't fall asleep, I will mentally review again what can escape me and how to keep everything tied up.

Cristina Porta and Artai with their family Rosa González

“Taking a trip is always a matter of planning, and people with allergies require much more exhaustive planning,” says Ángel Sánchez, president of the Spanish Association of People with Food and Latex Allergies (Aeppa).. Carrying a report from the allergist is one of the essential things to be able to access the plane with the medication, and to take with you a summary of the clinical history: “If possible, it can also be in English”. Language can be one of the impediments for allergy sufferers. “It is very important that they know what gives you an allergy.”

“This has all been new to us,” says the mother. They had no background in their family and learning has been their trump card. “We found out he was allergic to milk and eggs when he was five months old.. And at 11 it was the first time we gave him cereal and he had anaphylactic shock. Nobody prepares you for it. Suddenly, I saw how my son needed a second adrenaline rush and a helicopter had to be requested.”. The mother needed psychological support: “It is the key to having the ability to normalize that it is our reality and that you can live like this and you can travel, but of course, improvisation disappears.”

“Anaphylaxis is a severe allergic reaction that can be produced by the contact of an allergen with a patient allergic to it, be it a food, medicine, the sting of insects such as wasps and bees or latex.. Any allergen can trigger an anaphylactic reaction.. This is how David Baquero, an allergist and member of the Spanish Society of Allergology and Clinical Immunology (Seaic) explains it.. “It is very important to inform those around you, whether they are the people who accompany you on the trip or where you are staying, so that they know how to proceed in the event that something happens to you.”

Anaphylactic shock is called when there is cardiovascular involvement with a drop in blood pressure.. Many times it requires treatment with intramuscular adrenaline for the patient to recover, and medical assistance in the emergency room and observation for a while.. “By inhalation it is not usually so common, serious reactions are usually more due to ingestion”. By inhalation you can also have severe reactions such as bronchospasm (the bronchus closes) especially due to the vapor of shellfish and fish.. By contact “it is also difficult for it to reach anaphylaxis”, what usually arises is urticaria (hives, swelling of the eyelid…) and requires treatment with antihistamines and oral corticosteroids.

From the first moment you leave an Allergology consultation with a diagnosis of food allergy, improvisation is over for the rest of your days

Christina Porta

“I will never be able to explain how impotence strikes when seeing that something as inconsequential as wheat manages to take your son on a walk to the limbo of death in a matter of minutes. understand it costs. Assume it more”, publishes the mother. Deaths from anaphylactic shock are few, but they do happen, as happened last March with a 17-year-old girl allergic to cow's milk protein. “It is very important to find out about the characteristics of the country where you are going, and to know how you can buy an adrenaline in case you need to replace it, because there are countries where getting it can be complicated and very expensive,” says Ángel Sánchez. Cristina does not consider traveling to countries where she cannot have immediate health care.

“More than 1% of the population will suffer some anaphylaxis throughout their lives,” says the allergist. “It is something very variable, having had a mild reaction today does not mean that tomorrow you cannot have an anaphylactic reaction. Not all allergy patients have anaphylaxis, but it is on the rise.”. Suffering a reaction depends on the immune response. “Any allergic reaction is potentially anaphylactic.. You know how an allergic reaction starts, but you don't know how it will end.”. Baquero explains that people with multiple allergies are more likely to have an allergic reaction simply because they react to more allergens, “but there is no pattern.”

A study carried out by the Fundación Alcorcón Hospital (Madrid) indicates that some 113 people per 100,000 inhabitants suffer anaphylaxis each year. Currently, 30% of the Spanish population has some type of allergy, and it is expected that by 2050 it will be 50%, according to the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI).. For a person to be allergic, there must be three components: a genetic component, a component from the host itself, and an environmental component.. “The environmental component seems to be causing this prevalence to increase. Contamination is a factor that we have studied extensively and that is directly related to the increase in allergic pathologies” explains Baquero.

Alba Quadrado is a young woman who is also multi-allergic, who, although she has managed to cure some of them, still cannot eat fish, shellfish, nuts or eggs, and she is also a celiac. Quadrado has suffered quite a few anaphylactic shocks: “The last time on my birthday with a cake in which they told me that there was no allergen, but it turns out that yes, that it had a mounted egg and I ended up in the hospital”. For multi-allergy people, eating away from home can be a risk: «The restaurant can tell you that nothing is going to happen, but the human factor is always there and there may be mistakes. It is also an act of faith, but it is that, or you do not live ».

He has lived in Australia for a few months and has just returned. For her, one of the first steps is to know the regulations of the countries to which she travels.. In 2014 the EU Consumer Information Regulation came into force, which has introduced changes to the information that food operators must provide to their customers, and there are 14 allergens that must be declared when used as ingredients.

I will never be able to explain how impotence strikes when seeing that something as inconsequential as wheat manages to take your son on a walk to the limbo of death in a matter of minutes.. understand it costs. take it on more

Christina Porta

“It is not the same to go to an underdeveloped Asian country, than to go to a European country that is governed by the same legislation, or to go to Australia, which, although developed, has completely different legislation”. Knowing what is being eaten does not always depend on oneself, that is why the regulations are important to be able to recognize the ingredients. “Depending on third parties can cause you a lot of stress and make you not enjoy the trip,” he says.. The young woman says that there are many places she would like to travel to: “When I was in Australia my dream was to go to Southeast Asia, but it still gives me a lot of respect. I want to go at some point as a challenge and show myself that despite everything, it can be done.”

Upon returning from Australia, he had two flights, one of 15 hours and the other of eight. In the menu request he chose the vegan, “since they do not make menus adapted to allergy sufferers». The young woman says that there must have been an error in her request and they did not have food for her: «If it is not because I always carry food with me, I stay all these hours without eating».

Cross contamination is another disadvantage to consider.. For example, if they support an ingredient where a fish has been before, in the case of Alba Quadrado, it will cause an allergic reaction. Or if they cook with the same utensil in the same pan. Cristiana Porta explains that “with so many allergies it is very difficult to control cross contamination in a kitchen”. “We never go out to eat unless it's to the two restaurants that always cook our food in a separate frying pan, but I can tell you that we go once a year.. When we go out to eat, the child always brings his own lunch box.”

“Understanding that allergies are not only a threat present in food is one of the pending subjects in this society. Allergens are in a thousand imperceptible situations for those who are not used to living with them.” Cristina continues to reconsider whether traveling with her little one is a good idea. “It's thinking about it and millions of 'what if…' gallop in my head, but I tell myself: Do it, and if it scares you, do it with fear”. It's all for my little one: “I have to show him that he can travel.”

The legendary Moon missions with which the USSR robotically explored our satellite return in the 21st century, precisely at a time when the US competes with China to send their respective astronauts to our satellite earlier. Russia has no plans and surely no means to send its cosmonauts to the lunar surface, but this Friday it is preparing to send its first robot to the Moon since 1976, Luna-25 (also known as Luna-Glob).

As detailed by the Russian agency, Roscosmos, after several postponements and delays (the initial plan was for the launch to be in 2019), takeoff is scheduled for Friday, August 11 at 02:10:57 Moscow time (a hour less in Spain). A Soyuz rocket will be in charge of putting the lunar ship into orbit from the Vostochny cosmodrome (about 5,500 kilometers from Moscow), bound for the long-awaited south pole of the Moon, where it is believed that there are water reserves.

Due to this space launch, on Friday morning the Russian authorities will preventively evacuate for a few hours the village of Shakhtinskyi, in the Khabarovsk region, southeast of the launch site, as the town is in the planned area where rocket boosters will drop after they separate, Reuters reports.

The South Pole is also the place chosen by China for its future missions and by the US to send the Artemis 3 astronauts, who will set foot on our satellite in December 2025 at the earliest.. India is also going to land its Chandrayaan-3 robotic probe, launched on July 14, on the South Pole.. According to the authorities of that country, the descent of its probe will be on August 23, a few days after Luna-25. If they pull off a successful moon landing, the Russians would be the first to reach this coveted region.

The Luna-25 spacecraft, weighing about 800 kilos and powered by solar cells and batteries, will take between four and a half and five and a half days to reach our satellite, where it will land, “in a complicated area”, according to Roscosmos.. His work will consist of taking samples and analyzing the lunar regolith and conducting scientific research with his eight instruments in the so-called Boguslawsky crater.. The ship will test new technologies, investigate volatile organic compounds and the presence of water in this area. If all goes well, it is expected to be operational for a year.

If all goes well, the Luna-25 landing will take place a few days before another ship, the Indian Chandrayaan-3, launched on July 14, reaches our satellite.. According to the Indian authorities, the descent of its probe will be on August 23.

The Soyuz-2.1b rocket with the Luna-25 spacecraft ROSCOSMOS EFE

Between January 1959 and August 1976, the Soviet Union sent a flotilla of 24 space probes and satellites designed by the scientist Sergei Korolev to the Moon with the aim of photographing and studying the surface of our satellite.. Three of them brought samples of lunar rocks to Earth. Luna-24 closed this program that Russia is now taking up.

Although kept secret, the Soviets also launched a manned program to go to the Moon and compete with NASA's Apollo missions during the Cold War, with the N1 rocket, which failed to carry it out despite the fact that it is estimated that it invested 6,000 million euros. In 1976 this project was concluded.

The new Luna robotics program was approved in 2014, and in addition to Luna-25, Luna-26 and Luna-27 are scheduled to be launched in the coming years.

Russia's future lunar plans directly involve China, with which it has strengthened its collaboration in recent years, as shown by its intention to build a lunar base together in the coming years.

This cooperation with the Asian giant has been further intensified since 2022. The War in Ukraine has broken Russia's space cooperation with Western countries in most missions, except in the International Space Station (ISS), where despite threats from the former director of Roscosmos, it maintains its participation. The conflict in Ukraine led the European Space Agency (ESA) to postpone last year the ExoMars mission that it was preparing together with Russia, and which was going to put a sophisticated robotic vehicle on Mars to search for signs of life on the red planet.

Since the outbreak of the war, European missions are no longer launched with Russian Soyuz rockets, which has forced ESA to look for alternatives for the many satellites and spacecraft that were going to launch with them and has aggravated the crisis due to the shortage of rockets that the European space sector suffers.

Observing gravitational waves from merging black holes may reveal new insights into dark matter, a study led by University College London suggests.

The research, published in the journal Physical Review D, used computer simulations to study the production of gravitational wave signals in simulated universes with different types of dark matter.

Their findings show that counting the number of black hole merger events detected by the next generation of observatories could tell us whether or not dark matter is interacting with other particles, and thus help pinpoint what it's made of.

Cosmologists generally consider dark matter to be one of the biggest missing pieces in our understanding of the cosmos.. Despite strong evidence that dark matter makes up 85% of all matter in the universe, there is currently no consensus on its nature.. This includes questions such as whether dark matter particles can collide with other particles, such as atoms or neutrinos, or pass directly through them unaffected.

One way to test this is to look at how galaxies form in dense clouds of dark matter called halos.. If dark matter collides with neutrinos, the dark matter structure is scattered, resulting in fewer galaxies forming.

The problem with this method is that the disappearing galaxies are very small and very distant from us, so it is difficult to see whether they are there or not, even with the best available telescopes.

Instead of targeting missing galaxies directly, the authors of this study propose using gravitational waves as an indirect measure of their abundance.. Their simulations show that in models where dark matter collides with other particles, there are significantly fewer black hole mergers in the distant Universe.

While this effect is too small to be seen by current gravitational wave experiments, it will be a primary goal for the next generation of observatories currently being planned.

The authors hope that their methods will help stimulate new ideas for using gravitational wave data to explore the large-scale structure of the universe and shed new light on the mysterious nature of dark matter.

The doctor. Alex Jenkins, one of the study's lead authors, said in a statement: “Gravitational waves are a powerful new tool for observing the distant universe.. The next generation of observatories will detect hundreds of thousands of black hole mergers every year, giving us unprecedented insight into the structure and evolution of the cosmos.”

The co-author, Dr.. Sownak Bose from Durham University said: “Dark matter remains one of the enduring mysteries in our understanding of the universe.. This means that it is especially important to continue to identify new ways to explore dark matter models, combining both existing and current models.. Gravitational wave astronomy offers a path to better understand not only dark matter, but also galaxy formation and evolution in general.”