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The autonomic nervous system is known as the control centre for involuntary bodily processes such as the beating of our hearts and our breathing. The fact that this part of the nervous system also has the ability to spontaneously restore muscle function following a nerve injury was discovered by a research group at MedUni Vienna's Department of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgery as part of their study recently published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

In an animal model, a study, led by EPFL Lausanne with the participation of MedUni Vienna's Center for Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering, has identified a class of neurons that provides the crucial impetus for restoring walking ability after spinal cord injuries resulting in paralysis. This study was recently published in the leading journal "Nature".

Various conditions such as postpartum depression or postpartum psychosis can lead to an alteration in maternal behaviour and disrupt the mother-child bonding process. A research team led by Daniela Pollak from MedUni Vienna's Center for Physiology and Pharmacology has conducted a study in which they were able to identify the neuronal circuits in the brain that are activated during the learning of maternal behaviour.

New method enables measurement of glycolipids; now, for example, the relevance in cancer will be investigated So-called glycolipids, or "sweet-fatty" molecules, are a relatively unknown group among the body's diverse lipids. A method developed by an Austrian team led by chemist Evelyn Rampler of the University of Vienna has now provided deeper insights into the functioning of certain glycolipids, which are located, among other things, on the surfaces of stem cells.

Malignant tumours in the head and neck region are very heterogeneous and therefore difficult to treat. In addition, the lack of prognostic markers is a significant impediment to personalised treatment. A joint study by MedUni Vienna and the Christian Doppler Laboratory for Applied Metabolomics focused on the development and identification of specific markers to improve risk assessment for patients.

By Birgit Baustädter Researchers at TU Graz have for the first time reproduced the function of vision on a detailed model of the mouse brain. Until now, brain structures could be modelled, but it was not possible to perform specific functions.

Organ damage occurs in up to 70 percent of patients in the first few months following stem cell transplant. The precise reasons for this potentially life-threatening reaction have long been the subject of scientific research. Researchers led by Georg Stary from the Department of Dermatology at MedUni Vienna and Vienna General Hospital in collaboration with the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Rare and Undiagnosed Diseases have recently identified bacterial proliferation on the skin as a factor associated with the occurrence of the complication.

A study group at MedUni Vienna has identified a regulatory loop controlled by leptin, by which this adipocyte-derived hormone regulates hepatic lipid metabolism via the autonomic nervous system. The study provides evidence that this adipose tissue-brain-liver axis, previously identified in animal models, also exists in humans and is opening up new approaches for treating metabolic diseases such as fatty liver disease.

It is now well known that viruses can cause infectious diseases ranging from COVID-19 to AIDS to Ebola. However, medical science also assumes that viruses play a role in about ten percent of cancers. An international research team led by MedUni Vienna and the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna has now shown that human papillomavirus 42 (HPV42) drives the development of a particular type of skin cancer.

Early detection of Alzheimer's disease is critical if patients are to receive timely and appropriate care and potential treatments and preventive measures are to be used to the best possible effect. Scientists have so far identified several important risk factors that may trigger or accelerate dementia.

Researchers at MedUni Vienna have discovered that neurons have an emergency back-up system to enable them to remain functional even when their energy supply is disrupted. As in many areas of technology, an emergency back-up serves to compensate for any energy supply failures experienced by neurons. The results of the study have now appeared in the Journal of Neuroscience.

Mammalian sounds in general may be more flexible than previously thought Researchers at the University of Vienna used an acoustic camera that can visualize sound pressure to study the sounds made by Asian elephants. The animals utter their low-frequency sounds mostly from the trunk, or simultaneously from the mouth and trunk, and only rarely from the mouth alone.

Evolution of longitudinal division and multicellularity in oral bacteria. To survive in the oral cavity, bacteria have evolved to divide along their longitudinal axis without separating from each other. This is what a research team led by cell biologist Silvia Bulgheresi of the University of Vienna and microbial geneticist Frédéric Veyrier of the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS) recently discovered.

Alpha-1-antitrypsin deficiency is a genetic disorder that often leads to serious damage to the lungs and liver. Although there are already therapeutic measures available for alleviating pulmonary emphysema caused by the missing enzyme, the precise background to the associated liver damage was hitherto unclear and there was no known treatment option.

Scientists of the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB) and the University of Vienna believe that natural causes for the mass development of algae are unlikely. Recent investigations substantiate the suspicion that mass development of a toxic brackish water alga has taken place in the Oder River.

It is essential to assess the severity of multiple sclerosis (MS) in order to choose appropriate therapeutic measures, but this cannot be reliably done using existing methods. A MedUni Vienna study now shows for the first time that the retina can be used as a prognostic marker. Analyses revealed that retinal layer thinning as a result of an MS relapse predicts the severity of future relapses and, hence, the likelihood of disability.

An Austrian study led by MedUni Vienna showed that active brain metastases in breast cancer patients are partially or even completely regressed by a novel class of drug. This is a chemical conjugate of an antibody and a chemotherapy drug that, according to current findings, opens up a completely new avenue in oncological research and targeted therapy.

A multidisciplinary study led by Vanja Nagy (LBI-RUD/CeMM/Medical University of Vienna) and Josef Penninger (UBC/IMBA) characterized a novel gene, known as FIBCD1, to be likely causative of a new and rare neurodevelopmental disorder. Using data from two young patients with neurological symptoms, the researchers from both groups found evidence of a novel function for the FIBCD1 gene in the brain, and a potentially pivotal role in diseases such as autism, ADHD, schizophrenia, and neurodegenerative disorders including Alzheimer-s.

One in two premature babies receives transfusions of red blood cells (RBC) due to anaemia. There are no generally accepted clinical guidelines for the degree of anaemia necessitating blood transfusions. MedUni Vienna researchers have now conducted a critical review of the currently available literature.

Since 2020, Austria has played an internationally pioneering role in monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic by sequencing virus particles from wastewater samples. A recent study by CeMM Research Center for Molecular Medicine of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, the Medical University of Vienna, the University of Innsbruck, and many other collaboration partners now demonstrates unprecedented detail and accuracy when it comes to analyses of how wastewater reflects virus variant dynamics.