Archive for July, 2010

Special Antibodies to Fend Off HIV

Last Updated on Friday, 9 July 2010 05:34 Written by DarkKnightH20 Tuesday, 13 July 2010 10:00

Recently, NIH researchers discovered antibodies that are capable of neutralizing majority of the different types of HIV. It’s because of 3 different types of proteins (VRC01, VRC02, VRC03) that are created from B cells. These proteins generally begin show up only some time after the person has been infected with the virus, and therefore it is too late.

However, scientists may very well be able to utilize their power in an attempt to combat HIV through a vaccine. Through some tests, it was discovered that two of the antibodies (VRC01, VRC02) neutralized 91% of 190 different HIV isolates tested, which is pretty amazing if you ask me. Hopefully the elimination rate can be raised to 100%!

Source: Scientific American

Tags: Health, HIV, Science | Posted under News | No Comments

Firefox Plugin: Protection from Flash Attacks

Last Updated on Friday, 9 July 2010 05:16 Written by DarkKnightH20 Monday, 12 July 2010 10:00

Hackers exploit many different types of vulnerabilities in attempts to attack other users. Many of these attacks happen to be browser based since it is easy to get people to go to web pages. Of these browser attacks, many use Adobe Flash vulnerabilities instead of browser-specific vulnerabilities. A plugin for Firefox, called Blitzableiter, was created in an attempt to prevent Flash-related hacking attempts. Basically, the plugin reads the SWF file and attempts to sanitize the code, parsing each piece, then recreates a safe SWF for your browser to load instead. Very cool!

Tags: Adobe, Firefox, Flash, hack, Security | Posted under Security | No Comments