In the gastrointestinal tract, intraepithelial lymphocytes are tasked with protecting the epithelium against pathogens and participating in wound repair and correct mucosal barrier functioning. In a study published in the Sept. 15, 2023, issue of Science, researchers at King’s College London and collaborators have identified a specific subset of gamma-delta (γδ) T cells in the human gut, Vγ4 cells, which seems to protect against inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) progression.

From shift workers to flight attendants, disruptions in circadian rhythms are a risk factor for metabolic disorders. Several sessions held at the recent EASL meeting focused on that link, and how disturbances in the internal clock may increase the risk of hepatic disorders.

Current therapeutic options for chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) are not effective for all patient subsets and, due to their lack of specificity, often provoke toxicity and off-target effects. CD8+ T cells are essential in the fight against viruses but in chronically HBV-infected patients, these cells become unproductive and difficult to detect. At the recent Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL), Matteo Iannacone, professor of Pathology and Immunology from IRCCS San Raffaele in Milano, presented a novel interleukin 2 (IL-2)-based immunotherapy approach that used a modular cis-targeting platform to tackle HBV infection specifically in patients suffering from chronic viral infection.

Chronic hepatitis B affects around 250 million people in the world and its cure remains elusive. At the 2023 European Association for the Study of the Liver Congress in Vienna, Austria, Emily Harrison of Precision Biosciences Inc. presented the company’s work on using a naturally occurring endonuclease in the development of its ARCUS gene editing approach to eradicating the persistent viral infection.

While the liver is mostly known as the core of metabolism, contributing to the storage of nutrients and excretion of toxic substances, there is an increasing interest in how it interacts with the central nervous system through the liver-brain axis. At the 2023 European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) meeting in Vienna, Austria, group leader Kristina Schoonjans and her colleague Hadrien Demagny from the Laboratory of Metabolic Signaling at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, gave talks setting out the context of inter-organ communication in liver disease, adding new findings from their research in the liver-brain axis.

During the first talk of the Basic Science Seminar sessions at the 2023 EASL International Liver Congress, focusing on the gut-liver axis, Prof. Maria Rescigno from Humanitas University presented data on the interaction between the gut and the liver and the role of microbiota and intestinal permeability in health and disease.

The unprecedented rise in life expectancy has made advances in the understanding of biological hallmarks of aging, at both the molecular and cellular levels, essential. A joint effort between Baylor College of Medicine, Genentech Inc., Stanford University and collaborating institutions has led to the release of the first Aging Fly Cell Atlas (AFCA) as a result of a deep dive analysis of 163 different cell types in Drosophila melanogaster, the common fruit fly.