Bioengineering proteins for personalized medicine

 

One of the latest developments in biotechnology is genetic engineering of cellular biology without the use of actual cell. This technique is termed as cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS). Chemicals, biomaterials, and medicines can be synthesized easily with this sustainable method. Cell-free systems have one major shortcoming: they cannot manufacture glycosylated proteins, that is, proteins attached to carbohydrates. There are several biological processes involving the process of glycosylation. For the prevention and treatment of diseases, it is important to understand the reaction mechanism of glycosylation. Our main purpose is to control this process and synthesize glycosylated proteins through cell-free systems.

A team of researchers have collaborated to devise a novel approach and overcome this shortcoming. The team of researchers includes following people: Dr. Matthew DeLisa, Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Cornell University and Dr. Michael Jewett, associate professor of chemical and biological engineering at NorthWestern University. They have devised a novel system by capitalizing on the recent advancements of CFPS technology. They have been successful in developing the missing glycosylated component through a simple reaction, which is carried out in “one-pot” system. After glycosylating the desired protein, it can be freeze-dried for later use. To use the protein for further synthesis, it can be reactivated by adding only water. The frozen protein would get thawed and retain back its natural properties at room temperature.

This team of researchers successfully published their paper titled “Single-pot Glycoprotein Biosynthesis Using a Cell-Free Transcription-Translation System Enriched with Glycosylation Machinery.” This paper was published in the latest July issue of Nature magazine. DeLisa and Jewett are the two senior lead authors of this study. According to DeLisa, they have been successful in devising the world’s first glycosylated protein through cell-free technology. This protein could be very useful in various therapeutic areas, including the development of vaccines. This is because the protein can be freeze-dried and used in various locations, indicating the portability of these protein molecules. This is a path-breaking, powerful invention that can unshackle the existing models of manufacturing proteins.

With this technology, protein-based medicine can be easily developed and transported to remote areas. Thus, the lives of several people would be saved like never before. The cost of life-saving drugs and vaccines would decrease with this novel method of synthesis. Local small-batch production of life-saving drugs can now be carried out in remote locations with low resources. Life-saving drugs have been costly till date; however, this technology aims to bring down the cost of these life-saving drugs. Therefore, poorer patients in remote areas can now have access to better healthcare.

DeLisa is a senior scientist who has spearheaded several research studies in biomedical eningeering. He has always focused on investigating the molecular mechanisms associated with the biogenesis of underlying proteins in a living cell. It is important to note that the living cell is a complex environment wherein the main barrier is the cell wall. His lab has done extensive research on several living cells, such as Escherichia coli (E.coli). According to DeLisa, it is difficult to make important breakthroughs in cell synthesis as cell walls act as barriers in the transportation of materials, including proteins. The cell wall screens all the molecules before permitting them into the cell.

Jewett works at a sophisticated biomedical laboratory in NorthWestern University. A lot research studies have been conducted into advancing the technique of cell-free synthesis, that is, efforts were made to replicate the natural biomachinery outside the cell. A collaboration between DeLisa and Jewett was nothing but fruitful in addressing their common goal: synthesis of glycosylated proteins through cell-free systems. According to Jewett, there is always a tug of war in engineering the cells of bacteria. The cell only wants to grow and survive. As a scientist, we are trying to maneuver its capability and reaction mechanisms.

To develop this novel method of synthesis, cell extracts were prepared by the team using a high quality strain of E. coli. This strain of E. coli was specifically optimized to grow in laboratory conditions. This strain of E.Coli was termed CLM24. Key components of glycosylation were used to enrich this strain of E.Coli with high selectivity. A simple reaction scheme was used to synthesize the resultant extracts. The team has christened this synthesis process as “cell-free glycoprotein synthesis (CFGpS)”

What is the unique selling point of this method? Well, the cell-free extracts obtained by this method have the complete molecular machinery required for the synthesis and glycosylation of proteins. Therefore, a molecular biologist has to simply include all DNA instructions required for the synthesis of a glycosylated protein in the desired form. Thus, CFGpS has completely broken the shackles of the existing cell-based method. Thanks to CFGpS method, we can now synthesize complex glycoproteins within a single day.

The further advantage of CFGpS method is the fact that it is highly modular in design; therefore, several varieties of glycoproteins can be easily prepared using a variety of diverse cell extracts. In this experiment, researchers used a lab-grown strain of E.coli for preparing cell extracts. It is important to note that E.coli is a simple cell, which cannot carry out glycosylation on it is own. Nevertheless, we were able to develop CFGpS platform by using this simple strain of E.coli. This implies that a completely blank slate of E.coli cells could be engineered biologically to develop into a glycosylated system of desired capacity. With this method, the structure of carbohydrates can not only be controlled but also be manipulated to suit our needs. We can synthesize highly complex glycoproteins. This was not possible till date with the existing cell-based systems.

The field of personalized medicine is growing by leaps and bounds in developed countries, including the USA. This is a very attracted protocol for on-demand drug synthesis. A simple test tube could now be used instead of a large bioreactor for drug synthesis. The whole concept of personalized medicine has received a paradigm shift with this novel method. Based on the physiology of a patient, we can now develop a unique protein molecule for drug delivery.

 

 

Can Alzheimer’s be treated with aspirin?

Plaques developed in the brain can be eliminated with a low-dose aspirin, which is an effective drug that suppresses the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. The drug aspirin is very effective in protecting the memory of patients. These are the latest findings reported by neurologists at the Rush University Medical Center. The results of this study were published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

Our study is path-breaking and novel in the sense that aspirin is one of the most commonly used medication for various illnesses. More than 1 out of 10 Americans was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, which is a progressive form of dementia. Very few drugs have been approved by the FDA for the treatment of Alzheimer’s-related complications, such as dementia. Presently, only temporary relief is provided by these medications.

Researchers still do not know the exact cause of Alzheimer’s disease; however, researchers know the cause of dementia and memory loss, which is associated with the faulty disposal of amyloid beta. Amyloid beta is the most toxic protein to have been developed in the human brain. Researchers believe that the most important strategy for eliminating the progression of Alzheimer’s illness would be the activation of cellular machinery. Waste can be removed from the human brain with this machinery.

Amyloid plaques are clumps formed by the toxic protein amyloid beta. The connection between nerve cells would be harmed by amyloid plaques. Such a development is one of the major signs of Alzheimer’s illness. There seems to be a link between the reduced risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease and the consumption of aspirin. The most important component of animal cells, the lysosomes, is very useful in clearing cellular debris. In mice, lysosomes could be stimulated with aspirin. Aspirin is the component that decreases amyloid plaque.

The incidence, progression, and development of Alzheimer’s disease could be stopped by elucidating the development of amyloid plaques. To regulate the removal of waste products from the human body, a protein named TFEB. Aspirin was administered orally to mice, which were genetically modified to develop the pathology of Alzheimer’s disease.

To determine the parts of brain most affected by Alzheimer’s disease, we determined the amount of amyloid plaque in these subjects. In mice, the functions of aspirin medications are as follows: i) to augment the expression of TFEB, ii) stimulate the expression of lysosomes, and iii) decrease the pathology of amyloid plaque.

Aspirin is the most widely used medication for pain relief; moreover, it is also used extensively for the treatment of cardiovascular diseases. The findings of these research studies must be validated further. Aspirin could be soon considered as a therapeutic drug for the treatment of Alzheimer’s illness and other diseases related to dementia.

 

 

The delivery of advanced medicines is facilitated by a new technology in biomedical sciences

In Sweden, researchers at Karolinska Institutet have devised a novel technique that ensured the effective delivery of therapeutic proteins and RNA into cells. The method, which has been presented in Nature Communications, has been used to deliver gene editors and therapeutics of proteins.

The method is based on two components: the so-called extracellular vesicles and tiny bubbles, which are secreted naturally in cells. They transport molecules that are biologically active in cells. Two key components have been introduced to improve the quality of these bubbles.

These two key components are as follows: a bacterial protein called intein and a so-called fusogenic protein associated with a virus. The fusogenic protein would help the bubbles combine with the endosomal membrane and then release the contents into the cell. The intein would cut itself and would help release therapeutic proteins present inside the cell.

According to Professor Samir El Andaloussi, who is the last author of the study and researcher at the Department of Laboratory Medicine, Karolinska Institute, the engineering strategy is innovative and it presents an important step ahead in the development of extracellular vesicle technology. It can effectively overcome key barriers, which includes poor endosomal escape and a limited intracellular release.

A diverse range of conditions, such as systemic inflammation, genetic diseases, and neurological disorders have been treated with a method that has the potential of engineered EVs, which is a versatile platform that delivers therapeutics.

Dr. Xiuming Liang is the first author of this study. He has devised this technology that can effectively increase the feasibility of including advanced medicines, which improve the efficiency and reliability of therapeutic delivery in target cells.

Experiments were conducted on cells and live animals. In these studies, Cre recombinase was efficiently delivered in such a way that a protein could be cut and pasted into DNA and the Cas9/sgRNA.

These components were then used to edit genes. Cre recombinase was used to load extracellular vesicles. Then, these vesicles were injected into the brains of mice. This caused a significant change in the cells of hippocampus and cortex brain structures.

In conclusion, there is hope to use the CRISPR/Cas9 gene scissors or similar tools. These tools can treat severe genetic diseases, which occur in the central nervous system. The diseases were Huntington’s disease and spinal muscular atrophy. Systemic inflammation in mice could be treated with this technique.

 

 

 

The anti-tumor cells can be activated with common salt

 

In earlier days, cancer was supposed to be a death sentence. Presently, there have been many advancements in the treatment of cancer. Therefore, the rate of survival of cancer patients has increased, with many leading a good quality of life even after being diagnosed with cancer.

In recent years, adoptive T-cell therapy has particularly been developed as an effective cancer treatment tool. In this method, some of the body’s white blood cells, that is, the T cells, undergo such a modification that they gain the capability of recognizing and fighting tumor cells.

The efficacy of adoptive T-cell therapy depends on the metabolic activity of T cells. The T cells expression is generally suppressed in an immunosuppressive environment of tumor cells. Therefore, researchers had to identify factors that could overcome this suppression.

Historically, table salt was perceived as precious commodity. Its chemical name is sodium chloride. Today, common salt is a cheap commodity and used in kitchen recipes. A team of scientists led by Christina Zielinski have found that sodium ions, which are an integral component of common salt (sodium chloride), increased the efficiency of anti-tumor activity of T cells.

The researchers found that breast cancer tumors had a higher concentration of sodium as compared to healthy tissue. In particular, the T cells were acting strongly against tumors when the immediate environment had a high concentration of sodium.

The survival time increased in such cases. Furthermore, the researchers proved that the immune response of CD8+ T cells would be enhanced by sodium.

CD8+ T cells are immune cells that identify and kill tumor cells or cells that are infected with virus in the human body. In a previous study, researchers have reported that sodium can regulate other types of T cells, which are believed to be involved in autoimmune disease and allergies.

In this study, the researchers went on to know the effect sodium could specifically have on controlling the activity of CD8+ T cells in humans.

Various technologies were used by researchers to investigate how sodium regulated the genes and the metabolic process of CD8+ T cells. The human T cells were pre-treated with salt and then they were cultured with tumors.

A mouse model of the experiment involving T cells was also carried out. The researchers reported that in the presence of salt, the metabolic fitness of CD8+ T cells improved as the uptake of sugar and amino acids increased. Thus, energy production also increased in the cells.

Consequently, the immune cells were more capable of eliminating tumor cells, as seen in the experiments of cell cultures and mouse models. The researchers found that pancreatic tumors shrank in size in mice after they were injected with T cells that were pre-treated with salt.

 

 

Damaged cartilage of joints could be regrown with new biomaterial

 

Scientists at the Northwestern University have successfully developed a novel biomaterial that could be used to regenerate high-quality cartilage of the knee joints. The study was conducted on a large-animal model. It has a rubbery appearance, and it is material of a complex network of molecules. These molecules together assembled create a natural environment of the human cartilage.

In this new study, researchers used this material to replace the damaged cartilage in the knee joints of animals. They got promising results within just six months. They observed evidences of the cartilage getting repaired. There was a growing new cartilage, which consisted of natural biopolymers, such as collagen II and proteoglycans. They facilitated mechanical resilience in joints, and the process took place without any pain.

However, researchers have to perform more work in this regard. They are of the view that the novel material has the potential to prevent complete knee replacement surgeries in the near future. The material could be effectively used to treat degenerative diseases, such as osteoarthritis. It can also be used to repair injuries of sportsmen. The study has been published in detail in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Samuel I. Stupp is the researcher who led this study at the Northwestern University. He said that cartilage is one of the most important components of the joints in human body. During the course of time, a cartilage can get damaged or may undergo a breakdown. This can severely impact the overall health and mobility of affected people.

In humans, adults do not have natural ability to heal the damage done to cartilage. With this new therapy, researchers could induce repair in the damaged tissue that does not regenerate naturally. The mode of treatment offered has the potential to solve a serious clinical problem.

In this study, the human cartilage was activated with the use of “dancing molecules.” They could boost the synthesis of proteins associated with the tissue matrix. In another related study, a hybrid biomaterial was used in place of “dancing molecules.” The new biomaterial has two components: the first component is a bioactive peptide that binds with TGFb-1 (transforming growth factor beta-1).

The growth factor is an essential protein that promotes the growth and maintenance of the cartilage. The peptide modifies hyaluronic acid, which is a natural polysaccharide that is present in the cartilage. It also binds with the lubricating synovial fluid of joints.

Many people are well-versed with hyaluronic acid as it is a common ingredient of many skincare products. According to Stupp, it is also found naturally in most tissues of the human body, and this includes the brain and the joints. The researchers chose hyaluronic acid as it was very similar to the natural polymers of the cartilage.

The team of researchers were supervised by Stupp as they integrated the chemically modified particles of hyaluronic acid and the bioactive peptide. Thus, they strived to self-organize the nanoscale fibers into bundles, which resembled the natural structure of the cartilage. The main objective of the researchers was to create an enthralling scaffold for the cells in the human body. This would induce them to regenerate the cartilage tissue.

 

 

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ResearchGate and The Royal Society deepen their partnership of collaboration in the year 2024

 

The Royal Society and ResearchGate have joined hands to expand their partnership. They have decided to jointly cover all the journals of Royal Society, increasing the visibility and readership of 45000 articles at a global level.

Currently, the Journal Home product of Researchgate platform has increased the visibility of 10 journals of Royal Society publisher. These 10 journals are of open access and subscription model of publishing. In the year 2023, ResearchGate was provided content of journals published by Royal Society.

In the year 2024, both the parties have further strengthened their partnership as it was a successful collaboration. The readership and the reach of the content provided by the Royal Society has increased manifold due to ResearchGate platform.

It was found that in the year 2023, two open access journals of the Royal Society saw a 64% increase in their usage on the ResearchGate platform. The trend of increased usage continues for these two journals as their articles have been viewed more than 1.75 million times on ResearchGate in the past 12 months.

Using the platform of Researchgate, the Royal Society’s journals could get more engagement from researches who are in their early stage of careers. The publishers of Royal Society were targeting to increase their reach in this critical demographic group.

In the year 2024, ResearchGate has introduced a new product named Journal Home. There are dedicated profiles of all the journal titles of the Royal Society publisher. The important information and the content that is relevant is sourced from each journal and provided through the Journal Home platform of ResearchGate.

The branding of prominent journals is being done on all the associated pages dedicated to articles. Journal Home provides insights into unique network, paving the path to increase The Royal Society’s engagement with the journal community.

Each of the journals’ profiles contain the names of editors and authors. Thus, members of ResearchGate platform can understand how a journal is connected to a network of academic professionals.

Authors of the Royal Society publisher have benefitted additionally from the partnership of the publisher with ResearchGate. Their research work gets added automatically to their profiles on ResearchGate platform.

Thus, the visibility of the articles is boosted and the platform provides insights into who is currently reading the article and citing their research paper. Thus, the connectivity of the authors with the readers has increased significantly.

More 75,000 authors have benefitted as they have added their articles to their profiles on ResearchGate. The discovery and accessibility of these articles has increased sharply due to features of “Journals Home.”

 

 

Immunotherapy efficacy increased with the discovery of a novel drug that bypassed inhibitory immune cells

The immune system was recruited to tackle tumor cells. The survival rates of millions of cancer patients improved after receiving immunotherapy. But, the treatment method also has a drawback: only one out of five patients had a favorable outcome to treatments of this kind. Researchers at the Washington University of Medicine in St. Louis wanted to understand and address the limitations of immunotherapy. They performed an extensive research study and found that in the fight against cancer, the immune system can act as its worst enemy.

In another study, researchers investigated a subset of immune cells, that is, type 1 regulatory T cells, or Tr1 cells in mice. They found that these cells performed their normal function of preventing an overreaction of the immune system. Meanwhile, they also inadvertently suppressed the cancer-fighting power of immunotherapy. According to senior researchers at the Department of Pathology and Immunology at Washington University School of Medicine, the Tr1 cells have a heretofore character that is considered to be an unrecognized obstacle to the efficacy of immunotherapy.

It suppresses its fight against cancer. Therefore, in the mouse model, the researchers tried to circumvent this limitation. They could revitalize the cancer-fighting cells in the immune system. Thus, this finding is an important development in expanding the benefits of immunotherapy. More and more cancer patients can now avail the novel developments of immunotherapy. A detailed information of this study is available in the journal Nature.

Personalized form of immunotherapy is now available to cancer patients in the form of vaccines. Cancer vaccines are aimed at the mutant proteins, which are specific to a tumor in a patient. These vaccines encourage an attack on tumor cells by boosting the activity of killer T cells. At the same time, they allow the healthy cells to remain unaffected. In another study conducted by Schreiber’s group, it was found that helper T cells are also activated with vaccines that are more effective.

The helper T cells are another type of immune cells. They are used for recruiting and expanding the killer T cells. These cells are known to destroy tumor cells. These researchers tried to supercharge the cancer vaccine by adding an additional amount of helper T cell targets. They found that a different type of T cell was generated. This type of T cell suppressed the rejection of tumor cells.

In another study, a group of researchers laid down the following hypothesis: when the activation of helper T cells was increased, they could induce an enhanced elimination of sarcoma tumors in mice. They injected vaccines in groups of mice with tumors. These vaccines could activate the killer T cells in an equal manner and also trigger different extent of activation of helper T cells.

In their latest study, the researchers were surprised to know the activity of the vaccine. They had developed the vaccine to hyperactivate helper T cells. However, the effect of this vaccine was opposite and it suppressed the rejection of tumor cells. The researchers were of the view that the vaccine should have eliminate the sarcoma tumors in mice as it activated more and more T cells.

The vaccine contained helper T cell targets in higher doses, and this induced inhibitory activity in Tr1 cells. Thus, the elimination of tumor cells was blocked completely. In general, Tr1 cells control an immune system that is overactive. However, ours is the first study to show that they can dampen the fight against cancer. The brakes on the immune system are generally put by Tr1 cells. They prevent the immune system from attacking healthy cells of the human body. However, no previous study has investigated its role in cancer comprehensively.

Previously published data was investigated thoroughly by researchers. They found that more Tr1 cells were present in tumor patients who showed a poor response to immunotherapy treatment. The number of Tr1 cells was lesser in tumor patients who had shown a good response to immunotherapy treatment. When tumors grew bigger in size in mice, the number of Tr1 cells increased proportionately. This made the mice develop an insensitivity to immunotherapy.

Researchers wanted to bypass the inhibiting cells in mice, which were vaccinated. Therefore, they treated these mice with a drug that improved the cancer-fighting power of killer T cells. This drug was developed by Asher Biotherapeutics, which is start up in the field of biotechnology. The drug could carry out modifications in interleukin 2 (IL-2). Please note that IL-2 is a protein that boosts the activity of the immune system. The drug could specifically enhance the activity of killer T cells and reduce the toxicity associated with other treatments that do not modify IL-2.

The inhibition of Tr1 cells was overcome by the additional boost provided by the drug. Thus, the immunotherapy was found to be more effective. The lead researcher said that they are focusing on providing personalized immunotherapy and widening the efficacy of the treatment. The researchers said that in order to attain the most robust anti-tumor response, they had to understand how to trigger the immune system. For this purpose, they referred to related studies in recent decades. These studies investigated the basic immunology of the tumor. In our current study, the main aim of researchers was to improve the immunotherapy and to benefit more patients with cancer.

 

 

 

 

 

Immunotherapy is now supported by epigenetically active drugs

 

Drugs that are active epigenetically would help a cell in reading the parts of a genome. These parts were either blocked earlier or inaccessible to the cells of the human body. Thus, new mRNA transcripts and proteins can be formed. This important finding has been presented by scientists of the German Cancer Research Center and the University Hospital of Tubingen.

The immune system would be able to identify cancer cells, thanks to the activity of “therapy-induced epitopes.” Immunotherapies are now being provided to treat patients with different types of cancer. But, all the cancer patients do not benefit from immunotherapy. The treatment fails in some cases because the immune system of the patient is not able to identify cancer cells.

Antigens are protein structures, which are transported by cancer cells onto their surface. At this stage, the T cells of the immune system recognize and differentiate them from healthy cells in the human body. In such cases, immunotherapy is effective and successful.

The antigens can be proteins associated with cancer, and they are also known as tumor-associated antigens. Antigens could also be proteins that have been modified by mutations. They are known as completely new gene products. These products are formed in tumor cells when completely new areas of the genes are being read.

Researchers of this study decided to make the immune system quite visible to cancer cells. The cells were equipped with completely new antigens. This was possible due to the help offered by cancer drugs, which were epigenetically active. Many cancer patients are prescribed such types of drugs. The epigenetic markers of the DNA or the proteins associated with the DNA are subjected to these drugs.

Thanks to the epigenetic markers, researchers could determine whether certain parts of the ist genome in mRNA could be translated by cancer cells. Decitabine or the HDAC inhibitors are a class of demethylating drugs, which have epigenetic effect. They help in reading those parts of the genome, which were either blocked or were inaccessible earlier. Thus, new mRNA transcripts can be created in the cells.

In this study, a lung cancer cell line was treated with decitabine and HDAC inhibitor in a culture dish. This induced the formation of several new transcripts, which were detected by RNA analysis. The origin of most of the new transcripts could be traced to endogenous retroviruses. The sequences of these transcripts accounted for upto 8% of the human genome, so they were considered as relics of retroviral infections.

In general, epigenetic mechanisms block their transcription. In cancer cells, the effect of the neoepitopes is much stronger than that in healthy cells. These neoepitopes are induced by Decibtabine and HDAC inhibitors. Cancer cells have high proliferation rate. The researchers now had to determine whether the therapy-induced transcripts could be used for coding segments of immunogenic proteins, that is, peptides.

Mass spectrometry was used for analysis in this study. The researchers were able to identify 45 neoepitopes, which were present on the surface of cancer cells post-treatment. The results obtained were reproducible with a large number of different cancer cell lines. In the culture dish, the cytotoxic T cells could be activated by therapy-induced neoepitopes.

 

 

A new 5-year agreement was signed by Wiley and Germany’s DEAL Consortium

 

Wiley, a leading academic publisher of STEM journals, recently announced its decision to enter into a five-year agreement with DEAL Consortium in Germany. This consortium represents a collaboration of more than 1000 academic institutions of Germany.

The drift in scholarly communications has favored open access publishing, and the evolution of the hybrid model of publishing. The needs of the scholarly community will be better addressed by this partnership.

Thanks to this five-year deal, Wiley will now offer open access articles freely to authors of leading institutions in Germany. Thus, the readability and access to content would increase from Wiley’s portfolio of journals. Let us understand how this agreement benefits the research ecosystem of Germany.

The deal will facilitate a better understanding of all the scholarly institutions associated with OA publishing in Germany. The investment needs of journals would be recognized as they deliver high quality content with greater impact to researchers.

The deal also enables the development of a better infrastructure in terms of workflows. Thus, both the parties have agreed to support readers, authors, and librarians involved in the OA movement. Finally, all the institutions of the consortium will benefit from training sessions and workshops held by the well-established team of Wiley.

The deal between DEAL Consortium and Wiley is going to support a new wave of Open Access movement in Germany. This would be immensely beneficial to gain path-breaking results in the research community of Germany.

Kudos to the five-year agreement that dwells on supporting both the publishers and researchers associated with OA movement. The collaborative approach of Wiley has been much appreciated by DEAL Consortium of Germany. The cooperation model is sustainable.

 

 

 

A partnership between ResearchGate and Taylor & Francis eases access to scholarly publications

A partnership has been announced between ResearchGate and Taylor & Francis, making it a new development in the field of STEM publishing. ResearchGate is a leading professional network of researchers, enabling collaboration and sharing of research publications.

Taylor & Francis is a renowned publisher of journals and books in the academic world. With this partnership, Taylor & Francis would provide access to 200 high quality journals to researchers registered at ResearchGate.

ResearchGate has specifically designed a new service entitled “Journal Home” to cater to the growing demands of journals. All the 200 journals would get enhanced visibility on ResearchGate platform. A profile will be created for each journal on ResearchGate, which would be accessible to researchers throughout the platform. Every journal title will also have an article page, benefitting sharing, collaboration, and networking.

This development is interesting as it plans to make more than 100,000 recorded versions of open access articles freely readable on ResearchGate platform. All the articles written henceforth will be included in the 70 completely OA journals and be available for viewership on ResearchGate.

Taylor & Francis is an important name in the field of academic publisher. It has published cutting-edge research from various disciplines, such as sciences, social sciences, and humanities. Since Researchgate platform has more than 25 million researchers, this partnership would benefit the publisher immensely. It would increase the readership of viewers and engage the interest of new audiences.

The founders of ResearchGate have expressed their gratitude to the publishers: Taylor & Francis. They will be embarking on a new journey as they make so many articles freely accessible. Most scientific content is hidden till today under the restrictions of a paywall, thanks to subscription journals. ResearchGate supports the OA model of publishing in academia, paving a new way for researchers in developing countries.