SARS-CoV-2 is not just another respiratory virus.
It has evolutionarily selected features that actively manipulate innate immunity - similar to viruses like HIV, EBV, or CMV.
A new study in iScience shows how.🧵
What are formyl peptide receptors (FPRs)?
They’re innate immune sensors on neutrophils and other immune cells.
They detect signs of infection or damage.
Key types
FPR1: strongly pro-inflammatory
FPR2: dual, context-dependent
FPR3: poorly understood, but active in viral immunity
Jul 12 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
New study identifies 3 cognitive phenotypes in Long COVID - and raises a troubling question about insight and impairment.
123 adults
21 months post-COVID
All with some persistent cognitive complaints🧵
Participants:
Lab-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection
At least 3 months post-infection (median: 21 months)
Clinically significant cognitive complaints (eg attention, memory, planning)
No prior neurological or psychiatric diagnoses
Inclusion based on validated questionnaires: BRIEF-A & MMQ
Jul 11 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
A new prospective cohort study (Nature Communications, 2025) followed 74,000 adults in Southern China and found - elevated EBV activity (measured by VCA-IgA) significantly increases the risk of several cancers.
First - limitations.🧵
Conducted in an NPC-endemic region with unique viral and population genetics
VCA-IgA was measured only once - no longitudinal antibody data
Lymphomas and other cancers were grouped, not stratified by subtype
Jul 10 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
What actually helps people with ME/CFS and long COVID?
Not theory - but real-world data from 3,925 patients who rated over 150 treatments.
A new peer-reviewed study in PNAS (2025) analyzed what helped - and for which symptoms.
Here’s what patients report, symptom by symptom:🧵
Before we dive in - what do the percentages mean?
Patients reported whether a treatment helped a specific symptom (eg brain fog, fatigue).
So if a treatment shows 77% for brain fog, that means:
77% of patients who had brain fog and tried it said it helped.
It’s all self-reported
Jul 10 • 21 tweets • 4 min read
A new study in European Journal of Immunology (Mouton et al., 2025) followed hundreds of patients after COVID-19.
Their goal: understand why some people develop persistent symptoms - Long COVID / PASC.
The answer? T cells that never stand down.🧵
They followed over 450 people - both mild and severe COVID.
Findings:
40% of mild cases had PASC (sic)
57% of severe cases had PASC
But the key difference wasn’t viral load or inflammation.
It was how the immune system looked months later!
Jul 8 • 13 tweets • 2 min read
Two years after a mild, non-hospitalized COVID infection, 1 in 10 people had measurable cognitive impairment.
They were younger. They never needed oxygen or ICU.
But they showed lasting deficits in memory, attention, or processing speed. COVID didn’t have to be severe to hurt your brain. Here’s what the new study found 🧵
A new study (Scientific Reports, 2025) followed 698 people from Matosinhos, Portugal:
COVID-positive and -negative
Hospitalized and non-hospitalized
All tested two years later with cognitive screening and full neuropsychological testing
Jul 8 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Did you know SARS-CoV-2 uses the tetraspanin CD9 - the same membrane protein exploited by HIV - to infect human cells?
No, SARS-CoV-2 isn’t HIV.
But this surprising similarity reveals just how sophisticated this virus really is.
Let’s explore🧵
A new preprint (July 2025) shows that CD9 acts as a scaffold, gathering key entry factors SARS-CoV-2 needs:
ACE2 (main receptor)
NRP1 (boosts infectivity)
Furin and TMPRSS2 (spike-activating proteases)
CD9 clusters them at the membrane - like a viral docking station.
Jul 7 • 13 tweets • 2 min read
COVID & Depression. A new study (Ogando et al., 2025) shows how residual SARS-CoV-2 in the brain may contribute to depression and anxiety in post-COVID condition (PCC).
The mechanism involves IL-6-induced activation of monoamine oxidase (MAO), which disrupts neurotransmitter balance.🧵
What do we know about PCC?
Post-COVID condition (PCC) affects 10–30% of infected individuals.
A majority (incl kids) experience CNS-related symptoms:
depression,
anxiety,
sleep disturbance,
cognitive dysfunction (brain fog).
But how do these arise?
Jul 5 • 15 tweets • 2 min read
SARS-CoV-2 can trigger Alzheimer’s-like pathology even without genetic predisposition.
New research confirms fears: even mild COVID can leave neurological footprints.
The virus induces amyloid-β formation in the retina - a window into the brain.🧵
Researchers from Yale and Harvard examined postmortem human retinas and 3D retinal organoids.
They found that the Spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 triggers the production of amyloid-β - the protein behind Alzheimer’s plaques.
Jul 3 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Viral proteins alone can rewire the brain. No infection needed.
New study: SARS-CoV-2 proteins alone - without RNA, without infection - significantly alter brain activity in mice.@dbdugger 🧵
Researchers used virus-like particles (VLPs) - non-replicating shells carrying the structural proteins of SARS-CoV-2:
Spike (S), Nucleocapsid (N), Membrane (M), and Envelope (E).
No RNA. No virus. No infection. Just proteins.
Jul 3 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
Amyloidogenic spike protein, microclots & long COVID - new evidence.
In 2022, Nyström & Hammarström showed spike can form amyloid fibrils.
Now in a 2025 preprint, they show how specific spike fragments disrupt fibrin formation & block fibrinolysis.🧵
The original (2022) work identified 7 amyloidogenic peptides in the spike protein.
These fragments formed fibrils and slowed fibrinolysis in vitro.
But it was unclear which peptide(s) were responsible for the strongest effects. pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/ja…
Jul 2 • 13 tweets • 2 min read
Post-COVID cognitive decline is real - and visible in the brain.
A new study used brain imaging (PET) + EEG to analyze people with “brain fog” months after mild COVID-19.
They found:
suppressed brain metabolism
slowed brain waves
even in those never hospitalized.🧵
The study followed 28 adults (avg age 56) who had:
mild COVID (no hospitalization, no oxygen),
persistent symptoms like memory problems, fatigue, attention issues.
They were examined on average 5 months after infection.
Jun 29 • 15 tweets • 2 min read
Why does COVID-19 cause multiple waves per year while flu peaks only once?
A new Harvard preprint says: the key drivers are short-lived immunity and climate!
Not variants. Not human behavior.🧵
The authors analyzed US COVID data (2020–2023) using wavelet analysis and an epidemic model with gradually waning immunity.
Goal: explain why COVID produces 2–3 waves per year, sometimes in summer, sometimes in winter.
Jun 27 • 16 tweets • 3 min read
Targeting DNA sensors isn’t exclusive to DNA viruses.
Even RNA viruses - which don’t carry any DNA - have evolved ways to silence the same intracellular alarm: cGAS–STING.
This is convergent evolution in action: different viruses, different tricks, same target. @dbdugger 🧵
The sensor cGAS sounds the alarm when it detects DNA in the wrong place - the cytoplasm.
That DNA might come from:
a DNA virus
or even from our own cell (eg leaked mitochondrial or nuclear DNA during stress)
Jun 26 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
New meta-analysis - SARS-CoV-2 leaves long-lasting neurological damage in millions.
This isn’t rare. Not "just stress."
It’s a massive biological hit to the brain - with consequences for the whole society.🧵
125 studies, over 4 million people, ≥6 months post-infection.
Prevalence of key symptoms:
Memory problems 27.8%
Cognitive impairment 27.1%
Sleep disorders 24.4%
Attention issues 23.8%
Fatigue 43.3% ...
Jun 26 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
A new preprint (June 2025) shows that microclots formed during COVID-19 can obstruct capillaries and impair microcirculation.
And remarkably, an earlier peer-reviewed study reached the same conclusion - by a completely different method. 🧵
In the new study by Kell, Pretorius et al., SARS-CoV-2 is associated with abnormal blood clotting that produces fibrinaloid microclots - clots containing amyloid (!) fibrin that are resistant to fibrinolysis (breakdown). preprints.org/manuscript/202…
Jun 24 • 15 tweets • 3 min read
Persistent virus = persistent symptoms. New peer-reviewed data confirm - long COVID patients still carry spike protein fragments - and show signs of immune breakdown.
What’s left behind doesn’t stay silent.🧵
This 2025 study analyzed blood samples from 65 patients with post-COVID condition (PCC, aka long COVID).
All had been infected between 2020 and mid-2021, before Omicron.
Jun 24 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
New brain MRI study (2025): Post-COVID patients show measurable structural changes - even without hospitalization.
Participants were not selected for having Long COVID!
What was found, why it matters, and how this fits into what we know about hypothalamus-related circuits. 🧵
COVID-19 doesn’t always leave visible scars - but in the brain, it leaves measurable traces.
A new multimodal MRI study (N=76 post-COVID vs N=51 controls) shows focal loss in key subcortical and limbic areas.
Jun 23 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Aspirin and post-COVID diabetes:
A new large cohort study (35,000+ participants) found that daily low-dose aspirin reduces the risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 52%.
What exactly did they find? And why does this underscore the role of inflammation in COVID aftermaths?🧵
Researchers followed 35,525 adults in Italy from 2018 to 2022.
Main question: does daily low-dose aspirin (100 mg) reduce the incidence of new-onset type 2 diabetes (T2D)?
They used propensity score matching to balance age, BMI, prediabetes, and medications between groups.
Jun 22 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Lockdowns hurt children.
We hear it all the time.
But this study shows that COVID-19 infection itself - not just pandemic stress - biologically drives serious mental health risks in kids.
Among 180k children, COVID was linked to:
suicidality
self-harm
poisoning🧵
Researchers analyzed Utah health insurance data from 2019-2021.
They compared kids (6-15) with and without confirmed COVID-19.
Children who had COVID showed:
2× higher risk of suicidal ideation
2.05× higher risk of self-harm
2.21× higher risk of poisoning (eg medication overdose)
Jun 21 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
COVID can damage memory - even months after recovery.
Not just any memory: the precision of memory, tied to the hippocampus.
A new study shows that it doesn’t recover over time!
It actually gets worse.
A short thread on the hippocampus, neurogenesis, and a virus that lingers.🧵
The hippocampus isn’t just - a memory disk.
It’s one of the only brain areas where new neurons grow in adulthood!
It helps us:
learn new things
navigate space and time
distinguish between “same” and “similar”
Exactly what “brain fog” disrupts.
