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Why mixing vaccines could help boost immunity

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Why mixing vaccines could help boost immunity


We should soon have a better idea. A handful of trials are now under way to test the power of vaccine combinations, with the first results due in later this month. If these mixed regimens prove safe and effective, countries will be able to keep the vaccine rollout moving even if supplies of one vaccine dwindle because of manufacturing delays, unforeseen shortages, or safety concerns. 

But there’s another, more exciting prospect that could be a vital part of our strategy in the future: mixing vaccines might lead to broader immunity and hamper the virus’s attempts to evade our immune systems. Eventually, a mix-and-match approach might be the best way to protect ourselves.

Mixing on trial 

The covid-19 vaccines currently in use protect against the virus in slightly different ways. Most target the coronavirus’s spike protein, which it uses to gain entry to our cells. But some deliver the instructions for making the protein in the form of messenger RNA (Pfizer, Moderna). Some deliver the spike protein itself (Novavax). Some use another harmless virus to ferry in the instructions for making it, like a Trojan horse (Johnson & Johnson, Oxford-AstraZeneca, Sputnik V). Some offer up whole inactivated virus (Sinopharm, Sinovac). 

In a study published in March, researchers from the National Institutes for Food and Drug Control in China tested combinations of four different covid-19 vaccines in mice, and found that some did improve immune response. When they first gave the rodents a vaccine that relies on a harmless cold virus to smuggle in the instructions and then a second dose of a different type of vaccine, they saw higher antibody levels and a better T-cell response. But when they reversed the order, giving the viral vaccine second, they did not see an improvement. 

Why combining shots might improve efficacy is a bit of a mystery, says Shan Lu, a physician and vaccine researcher at the University of Massachusetts Medical School who pioneered this mixing strategy. “The mechanism we can explain partially, but we don’t fully understand.” Different vaccines present the same information in slightly different ways. Those differences might awaken different parts of the immune system or sharpen the immune response. This strategy might also make immunity last longer.  

Whether those results translate to humans remains to be seen. Researchers at Oxford University have launched a human trial to test just how mixing might work. The study, called Com-CoV, offers participants a first shot of Pfizer or Oxford-AstraZeneca. For their second dose, they will either get the same vaccine or a shot of Moderna or Novavax. The first results should be available in the coming weeks. 

Other studies are under way as well. In Spain, where Oxford-AstraZeneca is now being given only to people over 60, researchers plan to recruit 600 people to test whether a first dose of the shot can be paired with a second dose from Pfizer. According to reporting in El País, about a million people received the first dose of the vaccine but aren’t old enough to receive the second dose. Health officials are waiting for the results of this study before issuing recommendations for this group, but it’s not clear whether any participants have yet been recruited. 

Late last year Oxford-AstraZeneca announced that it would partner with Russia’s Gamaleya Institute, which developed Sputnik V vaccine, to test how the two shots work in combination. The trial was supposed to launch in March and provide interim results in May, but it’s not clear whether it has actually begun. And Chinese officials have hinted that they’ll explore mixing vaccines to boost the efficacy of their shots. 

The biggest gains might come from mixing vaccines that have lower efficacies. The mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna provide excellent protection. “I don’t think there’s reason to mess with that,” says Donna Farber, an immunologist at Columbia University. But mixing might improve protection for some of the vaccines that have reported lower levels of protection, like Oxford-AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, as well as some of the Chinese vaccines. Many of these vaccines work quite well, but mixing might help them work even better. 

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The hunter-gatherer groups at the heart of a microbiome gold rush

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The hunter-gatherer groups at the heart of a microbiome gold rush


The first step to finding out is to catalogue what microbes we might have lost. To get as close to ancient microbiomes as possible, microbiologists have begun studying multiple Indigenous groups. Two have received the most attention: the Yanomami of the Amazon rainforest and the Hadza, in northern Tanzania. 

Researchers have made some startling discoveries already. A study by Sonnenburg and his colleagues, published in July, found that the gut microbiomes of the Hadza appear to include bugs that aren’t seen elsewhere—around 20% of the microbe genomes identified had not been recorded in a global catalogue of over 200,000 such genomes. The researchers found 8.4 million protein families in the guts of the 167 Hadza people they studied. Over half of them had not previously been identified in the human gut.

Plenty of other studies published in the last decade or so have helped build a picture of how the diets and lifestyles of hunter-gatherer societies influence the microbiome, and scientists have speculated on what this means for those living in more industrialized societies. But these revelations have come at a price.

A changing way of life

The Hadza people hunt wild animals and forage for fruit and honey. “We still live the ancient way of life, with arrows and old knives,” says Mangola, who works with the Olanakwe Community Fund to support education and economic projects for the Hadza. Hunters seek out food in the bush, which might include baboons, vervet monkeys, guinea fowl, kudu, porcupines, or dik-dik. Gatherers collect fruits, vegetables, and honey.

Mangola, who has met with multiple scientists over the years and participated in many research projects, has witnessed firsthand the impact of such research on his community. Much of it has been positive. But not all researchers act thoughtfully and ethically, he says, and some have exploited or harmed the community.

One enduring problem, says Mangola, is that scientists have tended to come and study the Hadza without properly explaining their research or their results. They arrive from Europe or the US, accompanied by guides, and collect feces, blood, hair, and other biological samples. Often, the people giving up these samples don’t know what they will be used for, says Mangola. Scientists get their results and publish them without returning to share them. “You tell the world [what you’ve discovered]—why can’t you come back to Tanzania to tell the Hadza?” asks Mangola. “It would bring meaning and excitement to the community,” he says.

Some scientists have talked about the Hadza as if they were living fossils, says Alyssa Crittenden, a nutritional anthropologist and biologist at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas, who has been studying and working with the Hadza for the last two decades.

The Hadza have been described as being “locked in time,” she adds, but characterizations like that don’t reflect reality. She has made many trips to Tanzania and seen for herself how life has changed. Tourists flock to the region. Roads have been built. Charities have helped the Hadza secure land rights. Mangola went abroad for his education: he has a law degree and a master’s from the Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy program at the University of Arizona.

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The Download: a microbiome gold rush, and Eric Schmidt’s election misinformation plan

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The Download: a microbiome gold rush, and Eric Schmidt’s election misinformation plan


Over the last couple of decades, scientists have come to realize just how important the microbes that crawl all over us are to our health. But some believe our microbiomes are in crisis—casualties of an increasingly sanitized way of life. Disturbances in the collections of microbes we host have been associated with a whole host of diseases, ranging from arthritis to Alzheimer’s.

Some might not be completely gone, though. Scientists believe many might still be hiding inside the intestines of people who don’t live in the polluted, processed environment that most of the rest of us share. They’ve been studying the feces of people like the Yanomami, an Indigenous group in the Amazon, who appear to still have some of the microbes that other people have lost. 

But there is a major catch: we don’t know whether those in hunter-gatherer societies really do have “healthier” microbiomes—and if they do, whether the benefits could be shared with others. At the same time, members of the communities being studied are concerned about the risk of what’s called biopiracy—taking natural resources from poorer countries for the benefit of wealthier ones. Read the full story.

—Jessica Hamzelou

Eric Schmidt has a 6-point plan for fighting election misinformation

—by Eric Schmidt, formerly the CEO of Google, and current cofounder of philanthropic initiative Schmidt Futures

The coming year will be one of seismic political shifts. Over 4 billion people will head to the polls in countries including the United States, Taiwan, India, and Indonesia, making 2024 the biggest election year in history.

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Navigating a shifting customer-engagement landscape with generative AI

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Navigating a shifting customer-engagement landscape with generative AI


A strategic imperative

Generative AI’s ability to harness customer data in a highly sophisticated manner means enterprises are accelerating plans to invest in and leverage the technology’s capabilities. In a study titled “The Future of Enterprise Data & AI,” Corinium Intelligence and WNS Triange surveyed 100 global C-suite leaders and decision-makers specializing in AI, analytics, and data. Seventy-six percent of the respondents said that their organizations are already using or planning to use generative AI.

According to McKinsey, while generative AI will affect most business functions, “four of them will likely account for 75% of the total annual value it can deliver.” Among these are marketing and sales and customer operations. Yet, despite the technology’s benefits, many leaders are unsure about the right approach to take and mindful of the risks associated with large investments.

Mapping out a generative AI pathway

One of the first challenges organizations need to overcome is senior leadership alignment. “You need the necessary strategy; you need the ability to have the necessary buy-in of people,” says Ayer. “You need to make sure that you’ve got the right use case and business case for each one of them.” In other words, a clearly defined roadmap and precise business objectives are as crucial as understanding whether a process is amenable to the use of generative AI.

The implementation of a generative AI strategy can take time. According to Ayer, business leaders should maintain a realistic perspective on the duration required for formulating a strategy, conduct necessary training across various teams and functions, and identify the areas of value addition. And for any generative AI deployment to work seamlessly, the right data ecosystems must be in place.

Ayer cites WNS Triange’s collaboration with an insurer to create a claims process by leveraging generative AI. Thanks to the new technology, the insurer can immediately assess the severity of a vehicle’s damage from an accident and make a claims recommendation based on the unstructured data provided by the client. “Because this can be immediately assessed by a surveyor and they can reach a recommendation quickly, this instantly improves the insurer’s ability to satisfy their policyholders and reduce the claims processing time,” Ayer explains.

All that, however, would not be possible without data on past claims history, repair costs, transaction data, and other necessary data sets to extract clear value from generative AI analysis. “Be very clear about data sufficiency. Don’t jump into a program where eventually you realize you don’t have the necessary data,” Ayer says.

The benefits of third-party experience

Enterprises are increasingly aware that they must embrace generative AI, but knowing where to begin is another thing. “You start off wanting to make sure you don’t repeat mistakes other people have made,” says Ayer. An external provider can help organizations avoid those mistakes and leverage best practices and frameworks for testing and defining explainability and benchmarks for return on investment (ROI).

Using pre-built solutions by external partners can expedite time to market and increase a generative AI program’s value. These solutions can harness pre-built industry-specific generative AI platforms to accelerate deployment. “Generative AI programs can be extremely complicated,” Ayer points out. “There are a lot of infrastructure requirements, touch points with customers, and internal regulations. Organizations will also have to consider using pre-built solutions to accelerate speed to value. Third-party service providers bring the expertise of having an integrated approach to all these elements.”

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