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DÉCRYPTAGE - Une étude française montre que le cannabidiol serait capable de bloquer les premières étapes de la transmission du VIH dans les muqueuses génitales.

Une étude publiée début avril 2026 dans la revue Mucosal Immunology révèle qu'une molécule issue du cannabis serait capable de bloquer la transmission du VIH dans

HIV-1 transmission depends on the structure and immune cell composition of mucosal epithelia. Transmission mechanisms involve direct infection of CD4+…

Our team, "Cancer Immunotherapy and Cellular Reprogramming," investigates the co-evolution of cancer and immune cells to enhance the immune system's efficacy, overcome therapeutic resistance, and counteract metastatic progression. At the intersection of the Immunology and Cancer research axes of Institut Cochin, our work stands out for its focus on tumor and immune cell factors that either promote or inhibit tumor progression, particularly in the context of anticancer therapies. Using molecular targets identified in our research, we aim to elucidate their roles in cellular regulation in both mouse models and human studies. We are exploring the role of the epigenetic factor RINF in the reprogramming of (CAR)T cells, stromal cells, and tumor cells, as well as the impact of the enzyme IL4I1. The catabolic activity of IL4I1 impair immune cell effectiveness, particularly macrophages, in tumor control. Additionally, we investigate the cellular dynamics influenced by key cytokines (IFNs, TGFβ and GCSF), which modulate both the tumor microenvironment and metastatic progression. In parallel, we aim to identify predictive biomarkers for immunotherapy success or failure. Our research underscores the critical need for myeloid cell reprogramming, complementing T lymphocyte-based approaches, to improve cancer treatments. We also analyze the synergistic interactions between these cell populations following anti-PD1/PDL1 therapies or interferon-inducing treatments. Our ultimate goal is to lay the groundwork for targeting key factors in tumor evolution while refining Immunotherapy approaches, to develop innovative clinical solutions and transform cancer care.

The Mucosal Inflammation and Immunity team, led by Dr Molly Ingersoll with joint affiliation between Institut Cochin and Institut Pasteur, joined forces with the team of Dr Arturo Zychlinsky, director of the Institut Max Planck de biologie des infections à Berlin. Together, they discovered how a common urinary tract infection bacterium evades the body's defenses. When immune cells called neutrophils attack these bacteria, they cast sticky, web-like traps to capture and kill them. Dora Čerina, the led author, identified a bacterial sensor system that detects specific pieces of these nets. Once activated, this system works like a dimmer switch to calm the immune response, reducing harmful molecules by neutrophils and limiting inflammation. This allows the bacteria to survive longer in the bladder for a more persistent infection. Potentially disabling this bacterial sensor could boost the body's natural defenses and offer a new strategy to treat bladder infection without relying solely on antibiotics.

Scientists at the Institut Pasteur have developed an innovative strategy to combat SARS-CoV-2. Rather than targeting a virus in constant mutation, they propose blocking the gateway used by the virus t...

Johan Garaude is an outstanding cell biologist and immunologist, who is currently leading the Mitochondrial Biology and Innate Immunity team at ImmunoConcEpT. His team is interested in the cellular metabolism of myeloid cells and how it contributes to innate immunity against microbial pathogens. The laboratory particularly deciphers the mechanism linked to mitochondrial adaptations and nutrient usage in macrophages.  Recently, Johan Garaude recently contributed to show how macrophages recycle ingested bacteria to feed their own metabolism. Using original metabolomic approaches, his team elegantly demonstrated that macrophage use phagocytosed bacteria as a source of nutrients that feed various metabolic pathways including protein synthesis, anti-oxidant responses or central metabolism. Furthermore, his group has shown that microbial viability dictates the fate of ingested cargo by articulating specific metabolic pathways and by re-organizing the architecture of the mitochondrial respiratory chain in phagocytic cells. Johan Garaude is invited by Fatah Ouaaz.

Bladder cancer progression from non-muscle invasive (NMIBC), particularly the T1 stage, to muscle invasive disease (MIBC) represents a critical clinical transition requiring aggressive therapy due to high metastatic recurrence risk. Risk of progression of T1 tumors is mainly based on the presence of invasive tumor cells breaching the urothelial layer and invading the lamina propria. However, cellular and molecular events occurring in the tumor microenvironment (TME) that drive this progression remain poorly defined. To address this knowledge gap, we investigated the changes within the TME associated with the progression of bladder cancer. Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNAseq) analysis of untreated NMIBC and MIBC human samples, alongside multiplexed imaging, revealed extensive cancer-associated fibroblast (CAF) remodeling as a key feature associated with disease progression. We show that activated CAFs are present in small focal patches in T1 tumors that surround a subset of invasive tumor cells. Both cell types were more strongly associated with progression into MIBC than either population alone, supporting the interaction of these two cell types to promote tumor progression. I will address the implicated cross-talk using multiplex imaging, spatial transcriptomics, scRNAseq and in vitro assays. Overall, we highlight the importance of the stromal compartment and the cross-talk between specific populations of CAFs and tumor cells that may serve as a prognostic biomarker and therapeutic target in NMIBC. Paris post-doc seminar series.

David Fidock is faculty at Columbia University in New York and the new scientific advisor to the Institut Pasteur president. Plasmodium falciparum is tremendously skilled at overcoming therapeutics and host immunity. P. falciparum causes severe malaria in over half a billion individuals and kills over a million African children yearly. It also prevents sterilizing immunity even in individuals who have been infected thousands of times. Disease can result from severe anemia, hyperparasitemia, or other complications resulting from sequestration of parasitized red blood cells. Chemotherapeutic clearance of blood stage parasites is the key to malaria treatment and control, however it is systematically thwarted by the acquisition of resistance. David Fidock is invited by Molly Ingersoll and Catherine Lavazec.

An integrative proteo-transcriptomic analysis reveals conserved post-transcriptional regulation mechanisms in acute myeloid leukemia and introduces POSTCODE, a tool to detect regulatory alterations in...

Les travaux de Catherine Postic sont consacrés aux mécanismes moléculaires et biochimiques qui régulent le métabolisme énergétique en modulant le dialogue inter-organes, en particulier entre le foie e...