About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/visualizing-algae-eating-viruses-from-space/
Aug 23, 2014...
Emiliania huxleyi, up close and personal. Alison R. Taylor, CC BY
Algae isn’t just found in your garden pond or local river. Sometimes it explodes into vast “blooms” far out to sea, that can be the size of a small country. Such algal blooms can match even a rainforest at taking carbon out of the air. And then, in just a week or two, they are gone – sometimes consumed by viruses.
Given the scale of blooms and their vital role in both marine ecology and climate regulation we must know more about these viruses. Research conducted with our Weizmann Institute colleague Yoav Lehahn and others and published in the journal Current Biology, is the first attempt to quantify the affect of viruses on large scale algal blooms.
Mar 19, 2020... “This is the most important thing I can do,” says the Weizmann Institute’s Prof. Sarel Fleishman. His lab in the Department of Biomolecular Sciences was already studying SARS, which is, like COVID-19, a coronavirus. He is able to quickly apply his knowledge to developing computer models that allow him to design coronavirus antibodies – work that could lead to a vaccine.
Mar 09, 2020...
JERUSALEM, Feb. 24 (Xinhua)— Israeli scientists found that short-term acute inflammation in the mother's body during pregnancy can cause autism to the embryo, said Weizmann Institute of Science (WIS) in central Israel on Monday.
Signs of autism usually appear around two or three years old, but it is considered a neurodevelopmental disease, which suggests that changes could already be “brewing” in the embryonic brain.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/can-boosting-immunity-make-you-smarter/
Feb 12, 2013...
T cells, white blood cells that are a key part of the immune system, may also play an important role in cognitive function. NIBSC/Science Source
After spending a few days in bed with the flu, you may have felt a bit stupid. It is a common sensation, that your sickness is slowing down your brain. At first blush, though, it doesn’t make much sense. For one thing, flu viruses infect the lining of the airways, not the neurons in our brains. For another, the brain is walled off from the rest of the body by a series of microscopic defenses collectively known as the blood-brain barrier. It blocks most viruses and bacteria while allowing essential molecules like glucose to slip through. What ails the body, in other words, shouldn’t interfere with our thinking.But over the past decade, Jonathan Kipnis, a neuroimmunologist in the University of Virginia School of Medicine’s department of neuroscience, has discovered a possible link, a modern twist on the age-old notion of the body-mind connection. His research suggests that the immune system engages the brain in an intricate dialogue that can influence our thought processes, coaxing our brains to work at their best.
Mar 19, 2020... In this videoconference, the Weizmann Institute’s Dr. Ron Diskin of the Department of Structural Biology, an expert in animal-borne viruses such as coronavirus, shares his insights on the current pandemic. A Q&A session with participants follows.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/science-tips-march-2007/
Mar 26, 2007... Breaking down bone is a tough job. Yet, our bones undergo remodeling every day of our lives, as old material is cleared away so that new bone can form. In diseases such as osteoporosis, an imbalance in this process is responsible for the characteristic bone loss. New research at the Weizmann Institute of Science, which recently appeared in the on-line journal PLoS ONE, has revealed, in unprecedented detail, how the roving cells whose job is to digest bone seal off their work area as they get down to business.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/ron-diskin-mapping-defenses-against-hiv/
Oct 09, 2013...
Scanning electron micrograph of HIV-1 (in green) budding from cultured lymphocyte. Multiple round bumps on cell surface represent sites of assembly and budding of virions. Photo by C. Goldsmith
The race to find a cure for AIDS, one of Earth’s most pressing epidemics for more than three decades now, is often more of a chaotic relay. Thousands of international scientists must constantly revise their own projects to keep up with findings from across all scientific disciplines — always collaborating toward a common good, yet also trying to stay one step ahead of the competition.
Oct 19, 2016...
An Israeli startup is taking aim at a mega global health crisis: overuse of antibiotic drugs.
Haifa-based MeMed, founded in 2009, has won tens of millions in investments and prizes to advance two initial products: ImmunoXpert, now used by hospitals in the EU, Switzerland and Israel to determine rapidly whether an infection is bacterial or viral; and ImmunoPoC, a point-of-care version not yet on the market.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/the-secret-social-lives-of-viruses/
Jun 18, 2019...
Illustration by Karol Banach
Geneticist Rotem Sorek could see that his bacteria were sick — so far, so good. He had deliberately infected them with a virus to test whether each ailing microbe soldiered on alone or communicated with its allies to fight the attack.
But when he and his team at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, looked into the contents of their flasks, they saw something completely unexpected: the bacteria were silent, and it was the viruses that were chattering away, passing notes to each other in a molecular language only they could understand. They were deciding together when to lie low in the host cell and when to replicate and burst out, in search of new victims.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/two-steps-ahead-of-the-coronavirus/
Mar 22, 2020... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—March 22, 2020—A method for monitoring, identifying, and predicting where the coronavirus will spread has attracted considerable international interest. It was initiated and developed by scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science, in collaboration with researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Clalit Health Services and in coordination with Israel’s Ministry of Health. Other governments have now begun to implement the method, which is based on questionnaires for the general public and analysis of the data obtained from them. The questionnaires track the development of virus-induced symptoms, and the analysis relies on Big Data algorithms and artificial intelligence. Viral spread occurs in clusters of infection; thus, early identification of clusters may facilitate various actions aimed at slowing down the spread of the virus.
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