Former SS guard on trial, Oxford's shot at vaccine and UAE's Mars probe

A guard from Nazi Germany's concentration camp on trial

A 93-year-old former Nazi concentration camp guard going by the name Bruno Dey is in the middle of a high-profile trial over his complicity in World War II atrocities.

"Today I would like to apologize to those who went through the hell of this madness, as well as to their relatives. Something like this must never happen again," said Bruno Dey from the dock.

Dey is accused of complicity in the murder of more than of 5,200 people from the time when he worked as an SS tower guard at the Stutthof camp near Gdansk, in Poland.

The court is expected to issue its verdict on Thursday and the prosecutors have sought a prison sentence of three years. Though Dey's defence lawyer Stefan Waterkamp asked the court for an acquittal or a suspended sentence, saying his client "would not survive" jail.

In his final statement before the court delivers the verdict, Dey said - "I would like to stress again that I would never have voluntarily signed up to the SS or any other unit -- especially not in a concentration camp," , "If I had seen an opportunity to remove myself from service, I would have done so.".

Ironically, Dey is standing trial at a juvenile court because he was aged between 17 and 18 at the time. His lawyer, Mr Waterkamp, pointed out that a man of that age could hardly have been expected to break ranks, and that the teenage Dey "saw no escape". Dey, who now lives in Hamburg, worked as a baker after the war. Married with two daughters, he also worked as a truck driver to make ends meet, and later got a job in building maintenance.

Oxford publishes positive results of their own coronavirus vaccine

Oxford University’s Jenner Institute and Oxford Vaccine Group is moving forward with next steps towards finding a vaccine against COVID 19.

The results of the Phase I/II trial they published in the scientific journal, The Lancet, indicate no early safety concerns and induces strong immune responses in both parts of the immune system.

According to the reports, the vaccine provokes a T cell response within 14 days of vaccination, and an antibody response within 28 days.

In the study, participants who received vaccine had developed neutralizing antibodies, which the researchers suggest are important for protection, and the responses were even stronger after a booster dose, with 100% of participants' blood showing neutralizing activity against the coronavirus. In the next steps, the vaccine would be tested to confirm if it can effectively protect against SARS-CoV-2 infection.

During Phase I/II trial, the vaccine has been evaluated in more than 1,000 healthy adult volunteers aged between 18 and 55 years in a randomized controlled trial. Also, a subset of 10 people from the volunteers received two doses of the vaccine. Between April 23 and May 21, 1077 volunteers have received either the vaccine ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 or a placebo MenACWY vaccine. So far there have been no adverse health events related to ChAdOx1 nCoV-19.

The Phase III trials are already underway in middle income countries like Brazil and South Africa as Oxford along with UK based bio-pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, are collaborating with numerous clinical partners from around the world as part of a global clinical programme to trial the Oxford vaccine.

UAE's mission to mars

UAE's Hope Probe, has lifted off from Japan's Tanegashima Space Center. The probe will reach the Martian orbit in about 200 days from now and is designed to study the planet's atmosphere.

The probe is set on a 306 million miles journey and upon entering the Martian orbit, the probe will circle around for one full Martian year of 687 days to gather global pictures of the Martian atmosphere.

The probe will be examining the interaction between the upper and lower layers of the planet's atmosphere to find out more about its  surface corrosion, and the reason why Mars is losing its upper atmosphere.