Pick an object in front of you—a teacup, for example—and fix your gaze on it. You may think that you’re keeping your eyes still, but you’re not: Your eyes are frequently moving unbeknownst to you, making tiny involuntary jitters called microsaccades. In fact, these jitters are the reason you continue to see the teacup at all—they introduce just enough variety in the light patterns on your eyes to prevent your visual neurons from completely adapting to what they’re looking at….
The novel genetic engineering approach, tested in mice and laboratory-grown nerve and light-receiving cells, will initially have research applications. Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers say they have successfully used a cell’s natural process for making proteins to “slide” genetic instructions into a cell and produce critical proteins missing from those cells. If further studies verify their proof-of-concept results, the scientists may have a new method for targeting specific cell types for a variety of disorders that could be treated with gene…
LJI scientists connect TET loss of function to missing genes in embryonic stem cells. Genetic mutations kick start cancers. Some mutations shuffle the genetic code, others come from the deletion of key genes. At La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI), researchers have made a major breakthrough in understanding how deletion of the genes that encode TET proteins can lead to cancer growth. Their new study, published in Nature Communications, is the first to show the immediate consequences of deleting all…
– how actin filaments drive the cell’s motion. Actin filaments are protein fibers that make up the internal skeleton of the cell. They support cellular processes like the cell’s fusion and are also a major constituent of muscle cells. For the first time, researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology in Dortmund, Germany, have been successfully able to visualize hundreds of water molecules in the actin filament. Using the technique of electron cryo microscopy (cryo-EM), Stefan Raunser’ group…
International research team from pharmacy and chemistry develops an estrogen that can be switched on and off. Unwanted side effects in the body, drug resistance or environmentally harmful residues – drugs not only cure diseases or relieve pain, but can also have negative effects on people or the environment. This could be reduced by medical compounds that are only active at the site of an illness in the body. A research team from Pharmacy and Chemistry at Kiel University (CAU),…
… for applications in organic electronics. Marburg chemist Prof. Dr. Michael Gottfried receives an ERC Synergy Grant. Marburg chemist Prof. Dr. Michael Gottfried has been awarded an ERC Synergy Grant by the European Research Council (ERC), together with Prof. Dr. Michael Mastalerz from the University of Heidelberg and Prof. Dr. Holger Bettinger from the University of Tübingen. With their project “Tackling the Cyclacene Challenge” (TACY), the three researchers are pursuing the goal of generating a special class of ring-shaped carbon…
New study finds the chances of uncovering life on Mars are better than previously expected. Researchers simulated Mars’ harsh ionizing radiation conditions to see how long dried, frozen bacteria and fungi could survive Previous studies found ‘Conan the Bacterium’ (Deinococcus radiodurans) could survive over a million years in Mars’ harsh ionizing radiation New study shatters that record, finding the hearty bacterium could survive 280 million years if buried This means evidence of life could still be dormant and buried below Mars’…
European Research Council supports “n-AQUA” collaboration. If water is spatially confined to nanometer dimensions, the so-called “continuum description” breaks down, and molecular details matter. There are indications that new and previously unknown phenomena appear. An understanding is quintessential for technological applications, such as water purification. A project (ERC Synergy Grant) by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz (MPI-P), the CNRS and École normale supérieure – PSL in Paris (ENS-PSL), and the University of Cambridge now…
The new tool allows us to know when neuronal differentiation takes place in their definitive form and, in addition, the researchers have shown that their final position in the tissue depends on their birth time and place. The tissues of every living organism, for example the brain, are always born from a few cells that divide and move until they reach their final destination and position. The process of how a certain tissue or organ is formed is called morphogenesis,…
New findings suggest an explanation for how chromosome recombination is regulated during sexual reproduction. In most higher organisms, including humans, every cell carries two versions of each gene, which are referred to as alleles. Each parent passes on one allele to each offspring. As they are linked together on chromosomes, adjacent genes are usually inherited together. However, this is not always the case. Why? The answer is recombination, a process that shuffles the allele content between homologous chromosomes during cell…
Major depressive disorder affects women twice as often as men, but researchers are still trying to identify the reasons why. Researchers at Michigan State University have recently received a $3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to continue their investigation of how male and female brains respond to stress differently and how testosterone could be the key to increasing resilience. The National Institute of Mental Health has begun to look at biological sex as a variable that could…
… enables early detection of hereditary cancer risk. The NCT is a cross-site cooperation between the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Heidelberg University Hospital (UKHD) in Heidelberg, as well as the DKFZ, the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden, the Carl Gustav Carus Faculty of Medicine at TU Dresden and the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) in Dresden. Hereditary genetic mutations play an important role in oncogenesis, but they usually remain undetected. An international team of researchers in the German…
Ferroptosis, an iron-dependent regulated cell death process driven by excessive lipid peroxides and membrane injury, can enhance cancer vulnerability to chemotherapy. Lipid peroxidation of unsaturated lipids (UL) in biological membranes is a key to inducing ferroptosis. However, there is a significant thermodynamic barrier for hydrophilic polar nonelectrolytes (e.g., hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and hydroxyl radicals (•OH)) and ions to diffuse toward the center of the lipid bilayer for the initiation of lipid peroxidation. Improving the local content of diffusion-limited ROS in…
Engineers develop stable devices that don’t require expensive iridium. Creating a hydrogen economy is no small task, but Rice University engineers have discovered a method that could make oxygen evolution catalysis in acids, one of the most challenging topics in water electrolysis for producing clean hydrogen fuels, more economical and practical. The lab of chemical and biomolecular engineer Haotian Wang at Rice’s George R. Brown School of Engineering has replaced rare and expensive iridium with ruthenium, a far more abundant precious metal, as the positive-electrode catalyst in a reactor that splits water into…
A new study reveals that the protein MTCH2, which is essential in a variety of cellular processes, is responsible for shuttling various other proteins into the membrane of mitochondria. The finding could have implications for cancer treatments. Mitochondria — the organelles responsible for energy production in human cells — were once free-living organisms that found their way into early eukaryotic cells over a billion years ago. Since then, they have merged seamlessly with their hosts in a classic example of symbiotic…
The multicellular stage of the amoeba Dicyostelium discoideum is partially regulated by an intensely yellow natural substance, as researchers of the Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology – Hans Knöll Institute (Leibniz-HKI) have discovered. The newly identified natural substance of the polyketide family prevents the amoebae spores from hatching too early. The study was published in the scientific journal PNAS. Social amoebae are unicellular organisms that can join together to form a multicellular organism visible to the…
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