COVID-19

Lessons from animal coronaviruses

Successful vaccines have been developed for many coronaviruses that affect pets and livestock. Dr Michael James Francis explores lessons these provide in developing a COVID-19 vaccine

"There'll be PhDs written on the psychology and politics of this topic"

A lack of research and old medical dogma have caused deadly delays in public health bodies accepting that airborne transmission of COVID-19 was happening, says aerosols expert Professor Lidia Morawska

Coping with COVID

Laura Bellingan explores responses to an RSB survey that found three-quarters of UK researchers have had to abandon or suspend research due to COVID-19

“If this doesn’t work, I’m not sure anything will”

Professor Sarah Gilbert on the science behind one of the world’s most advanced COVID-19 vaccine trials, and what still needs to be done to prove it is safe and effective

'We don't have to demonstrate we can do it anymore, we need to demonstrate how well we can do it'

Professor Andrew Singer says surveillance of wastewater will be a 'game-changer' for monitoring COVID-19 and other disease outbreaks

“There were at least three papers in 2019 that said coronaviruses might be a real problem in south China”

Professor Kate Jones says a woeful lack of communication between public health bodies and ecologists is failing to prevent spillover of animal diseases into human populations

"All I'm presenting is a range of possibilities"

Theoretical epidemiologist Professor Sunetra Gupta discusses alternative models of how and when COVID-19 might have spread through the UK

Scientists of the world unite!

Since the pandemic began Tom Ireland has been talking to bioscientists from around the world who have sprung into action to help to understand, track and treat COVID-19

“Everyone leaves their ego at the door and is so upbeat, even at 4am"

Adrienne Adele Cox tells The Biologist about volunteering at one of the UK's three new mega-labs, set up to scale up COVID-19 testing.

"Everyone is running themselves ragged”

The University of Arizona’s Michael D L Johnson is using his knowledge of metal compounds to explore potential therapeutics for COVID-19.

Why an oral vaccine could be key to fighting COVID-19

Dr Elliot Bland is helping develop a potential vaccine stable enough to post to millions of citizens as a capsule, rather than one requiring healthcare professionals and needles.

"I don't think the department has ever locked its doors to academics before in 200 years"

Biophysicist Professor Pietro Cicuta tells Tom Ireland how nearly a thousand Cambridge researchers have joined his Slack channel to develop coronavirus ideas – from ventilator prototypes to an app that diagnoses the disease from the sound of coughing.

“If all this new data isn’t understood and interpreted in context, it could lead to some really harmful public policy decisions"

US virologist Dr Angela Rasmussen talks to Tom Ireland about how COVID-19 differs to previous outbreaks she has studied, the danger of press releases and pre-prints being used as data, and the ‘incoherent’ response at the federal level.

“Our entire way of working has changed”

Immunologists Dr Elizabeth Mann and Dr Madhvi Menon are on the frontline of COVID-19 research, following the immune responses of patients arriving at hospitals across Manchester.

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