Luiz Philipe, who was born with microcephaly, sleeps in his house in Marica, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil, on March 9, 2016. Brazil will adopt the World Health Organization (WHO) standards from the next week to determine if a baby has microcephaly, the Brazilian Health Ministry said on Wednesday. [Photo/Xinhua] WASHINGTON -- Chinese researchers said Thursday they might have solved the mystery of why the Zika virus causes microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size that can lead to severe developmental problems in babies. In a study published in the US journal Science, a team led by Cheng-Feng Qin of the Beijing Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology reported that one single genetic change, likely acquired in 2013, gave the mosquito-borne virus the ability to cause severe fetal microcephaly. Our findings offer a reasonable explanation for the unexpected causal link of Zika to microcephaly, and will help understand how Zika evolved from an innocuous mosquito-borne virus into a congenital pathogen with global impact, Qin said. Zika was first identified in 1947 in Uganda, and until its recent emergence in the Americas, was a little known one that sporadically causes mild infections. Then, it rapidly swept through South and Central America in 2015, and due to its link to congenital brain abnormalities, especially microcephaly during pregnancy, the World Health Organization declared in early 2016 the current epidemics a public health emergency of international concern. However, scientists remain unable to determine why the virus evolved into a pathogen triggering severe neurological syndromes. By comparing contemporary Zika virus strains from the 2015 and 2016 South American epidemics with an ancestral Cambodian virus that was circulating in 2010, Qin and colleagues found one critical mutation that conferred the ability to cause microcephaly in mouse models of fetal infection. That one change, S139N, which replaced a serine amino acid with an asparagine at the 139th position of a Zika protein called prM, also made the virus more lethal to human neuron precursor cells in culture compared with the ancestral form. Zika accumulated numerous changes throughout its genome between 2010 and 2016, of which S139N caused substantially more severe microcephaly and embryonic lethality in mouse models. Evolutionary analyses revealed that the S139N change likely arose sometime around 2013, which coincided with initial reports of microcephaly. It was then stably maintained during subsequent spread to the America. The discovery should provide guidance for the study of pathogenetic mechanisms of the Zika virus and for the development of vaccines and treatments, Qin said. create your own wristbandcustom made rubber braceletscool wristbandscustom fidget spinnersblack rubber wristbands202mm to incheswide rubber bands
The annual Cybersecurity Week, an activity aimed at raising awareness about knowledge and policies related to cybersecurity, will be held in Shanghai on Sept 16, China's top internet watchdog said on Friday. Organized by multiple authorities, including the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Education and Bank of China, this will be the third time the activity is held in the country. The first two were respectively held in Beijing and Wuhan, Hubei province. This time, the activity will focus on the enforcement of the Cybersecurity Law, which came into effect on June 1, as well as protection of personal information, a hot topic especially after an 18-year-old student in Shandong province died of cardiac arrest after being cheated out of her tuition fees last year. The activity will run until Sept 24. Jiang Xun, organizer of the activity from Shanghai, said many internet and technology giants, such as Alibaba and Qihoo 360, will also attend the event, where they will introduce their new security products and their efforts against online attacks. "The security products will be displayed during an exhibition, and everyone can visit the activity for free," he said. A summit on cybersecurity technology will also be held, with several foreign guests from the United States, France and South Korea taking part, according to him. "We'll hold forums on different topics, such as mobile networking and big data protection, and provide visitors knowledge about different aspects of online security. For example, we'll teach and popularize the Cybersecurity Law and online security-related tips in schools and communities." In addition, to encourage cybersecurity talents, including teachers and enterprises, the activity will award the best, said Zhao Zeliang, director of the administration's cybersecurity coordination bureau. "After all, the key to improving cybersecurity is to educate more talents, asking them to further study cybersecurity technologies," he added.
