New research in monkeys suggests that, although living in an “enriched” environment can make someone less vulnerable to abusing cocaine, once started, extended drug abuse can eliminate the social advantage the abuser originally had.
However, the research also shows that prolonged abstinence from drug use can give the recovering addict another chance, and that environment again becomes a major factor influencing the success of the recovery.
Michael A. Nader, Ph.D., prof
A group of Belgian researchers has determined that a pregnant woman’s ability to metabolize fats is determined not only by her genes but by her baby’s genes as well. The details of their findings appear in the November issue of the Journal of Lipid Research, an American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology journal.
The researchers, led by Olivier S. Descamps of the Centre de Recherche Médicale de Jolimont in Haine Saint-Paul and of the Université Catholiq
Weizmann Institute scientists develop new analytical method
Some fundamental outstanding questions in science – “Where do stem cells originate?” “How does cancer develop?” “When do cell types split off from each other in the embryo?” – might be answered if scientists had a way to map the history of the body’s cells going back to the fertilized egg. Now, a multidisciplinary team at the Weizmann Institute of Science has developed an analytical method that can trace the lineage trees
Who would get mixed with a hefty chap two meters high? There would be few those who wish. Just imagine that in a moment of danger this “hefty chap” becomes thrice as large… Is it fantasy? It is, if we are talking about people. But if it comes to unicellular algae, it is a typical scenario provided by nature for them. The scenedesmus unicellular alga grows thrice as large in presence of predators – cladoceran and rotifers that eat up unicellular algae. This is a defence mechanism as rotifers
New tool speeding the discovery of genes for common diseases
The International HapMap Consortium today published a comprehensive catalog of human genetic variation, a landmark achievement that is already accelerating the search for genes involved in common diseases, such as asthma, diabetes, cancer and heart disease.
In a paper in the Oct. 27 issue of the journal Nature, more than 200 researchers from Canada, China, Japan, Nigeria, the United Kingdom and the United
An extensive research analysis by a neuroscientist at UCLA’s Semel Institute and the Veterans Affairs’ Neurobiology Research Laboratory concludes that environment and diet largely determine sleep needs.
Appearing in the Oct. 27 edition of the peer-reviewed journal Nature, the analysis shows that meat-eating species sleep the most and grazing animals the least. Sleep amounts range from 20 hours in the little brown bat to only two hours in the horse. Animals that have le
Scientists have identified the gene responsible for controlling a first key step in the creation of new life, according to new research published in the journal Nature tomorrow (Thursday 27 October 2005).
The gene, known as HIRA, ‘chaperones’ the early processes that take place once a sperm enters an egg, giving it a crucial role in the most fundamental process in sexually reproducing animals.
The absence or mutation of this gene in the maternal (mother’s) genome explai
Rice team mitigates toxicity of tiny cylinders with chemical changes
In follow-on work to last year’s groundbreaking toxicological study on water-soluble buckyballs, researchers at Rice University’s Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology (CBEN) find that water-soluble carbon nanotubes are significantly less toxic to begin with. Moreover, the research finds that nanotubes, like buckyballs, can be rendered nontoxic with minor chemical modifications.
Preliminary trial offers encouragement for definitive tests of cardiac regeneration technique
Left ventricular function and exercise capacity increased, while the area of heart muscle damage shrank, in 18 patients given infusions of their own bone marrow stem cells up to eight years after a heart attack, according to a new study in the Nov. 1, 2005, issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
“This new therapy is able to treat until now irreversible heart
Researchers studying how proteins called helicases travel along strands of DNA have found that when the proteins hit an obstacle they snap back to where they began, repeating the process over and over, possibly playing a preventative role in keeping the genome intact.
Taekjip Ha, a professor of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, likens the biological scenario to Boston Red Sox baseball; the team rolls along
French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot first described amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in 1869, but, nearly 140 years later, little is known about the cause of the devastating neurodegenerative disease, and there is no cure.
What is known about Lou Gehrig’s disease, as it is commonly called, is that misfolded and damaged proteins clump together in cells to form aggregates and motor neurons die. But scientists have long debated whether or not the protein aggregates actually
A carbohydrate isolated from the liver lowers blood sugar levels after it is injected into diabetic rats, according to research carried out by a team of experts at the University of Virginia Health System. The UVa team believes this compound, called D-chiro-Inositol-Galactosamine, or INS2, acts as a messenger inside cells to switch on enzymes that regulate blood sugar, taking glucose from the bloodstream into the liver and muscles where it is stored. INS2 is naturally occurring in the body and
Research with cichlid fish offers support for a gene that regulates craniofacial diversity
Researchers at the Forsyth Institute have discovered that the genes that influence the jaws of cichlid fish, tropical freshwater fish renowned for head shape diversity, offer insight into overall vertebrate diversity. The scientific studies led by R. Craig Albertson, PhD., Staff Associate, show that the growth factor gene, bmp4, is both associated with and has the potential to alter jaw morpho
Faster Computation of Haplotypes Provides Insight into Genetic Basis of Human Disease
High-throughput sequencing of an individual’s DNA yields a map of genetic variation which can give clues to the genetic underpinning of human disease. The current technologies collect genotypes, or information from the individual’s two chromosomes. Yet many scientists believe that drilling down to the variations between individuals’ DNA at the level of each chromosome — so-ca
Blocking a signaling lipid can keep nerves from developing the arm-like extensions they need to wire the body and may even cause neurons to die, researchers have found.
The researchers hope this piece of the puzzle of how the central nervous system develops in the first place will one day help them repair loss from injury or disease.
It’s already helped them understand the ailments of a spontaneous mouse mutant that has about 20 percent function of the protein that helps
Researchers from Monash’s Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology have determined the structure of the protein JAK2 kinase, a discovery with huge implications for the design and development of new cancer drugs.
NHMRC Industry Research Fellow Dr Isabelle Lucet, from Monash’s Protein Crystallography Unit headed by Dr Jamie Rossjohn, was part of the team that determined the structure. JAK2 kinase was the driving force for many cancers and cardiovascular disorders,
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