Trends

Taking On the Common Cold

  • February 1997
  • By Rex Graham
   

Colds researchers deleted the word "cure" from their lexicons in the early 1960s when they discovered that some 200 different viruses can cause colds-far too many to conquer with a vaccine, the conventional method of defeating an infectious disease. With the discovery of each new family of cold virus-rhinovirus, coronavirus, Coxsackie virus, adenovirus, respiratory syncytial virus, to name a few-researchers sank into a deeper funk. And as funding for common-cold research by the National Institutes of Health dwindled to its current level of $2 million per year, a mere 0.02 percent of its total budget, most researchers moved on to study influenza, herpes, AIDS, or other viral diseases.

But after years of low-profile research, biologists who remained dedicated to fighting the common cold believe they have homed in on a strategy both to stop cold viruses from replicating and to dampen the immune response that produces symptoms-together, the closest thing yet to a cure.

 

To read the entire article you must log in:

Most of our content — all daily news, blogs, and videos — is free. Magazine stories are paid. To read this story, you must have a subscription or you must use a reading credit. Registration to Technology Review is free and entitles registrants to three free reading credits.

Username or REGISTER
Password  
   
 
Advertisement

MAGAZINE

Can We Build Tomorrow's Breakthroughs?

Manufacturing in the United States is in trouble. That's bad news not just for the country's economy but for the future of innovation.

Videos

Meet 2011 TR35 Winner Jesse Robbins

More

Advertisement

Technology Review Lists

TR50

Our list of the 50 most innovative companies, including the following:

iRobot

Zynga

Groupon

PrimeSense

More

Advertisement

Facebook

Advertisement