Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Diseases are abnormal conditions that have a specific set of signs and symptoms. Diseases can have an external cause, such as an infection, or an internal cause, such as autoimmune diseases.
Fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD) is a poorly understood blood vessel disorder that affects up to 5% of adults. Using a systems genetics approach, we identified an FMD-associated gene co-expression network that governs vascular cell function and developed a mouse model of FMD that recapitulates certain aspects of the human disease.
Tiny cellular tubes between neurons and brain cells called microglia serve as conduits for the export of toxic protein aggregates from neurons and the import of healthy organelles, keeping neurodegeneration at bay.
A study uses '-omics' and artificial intelligence to derive a metric that distinguishes normal immunity from its perturbation — and reveals that healthy immune systems are less alike than anticipated.
Genetic testing for inherited cardiac disease has become part of routine clinical care. In this Review, Verdonschot et al. provide an overview of the reproductive options in the context of monogenic cardiac diseases, with a focus on preimplantation genetic testing, to prepare health-care professionals for discussions with their patients.
Cardiomyocytes can activate the type I interferon response in the infarct border zone after myocardial infarction, indicating that the type I interferon pathway, in addition to its well-established role in antiviral responses, is also involved in cardiac injury.
Thomas Mettenleiter was president of the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut for 27 years and retired in June 2023. Looking back, he reflects on events around and following the reunification of Germany that changed his career path.