Antibiotic resistance has put humans in an escalating ’arms race’ with infectious bacteria, as scientists try to develop new antibiotics faster than the bacteria can evolve new resistance strategies. But now, researchers have a new strategy that may give them a leg up in the race—reproducing in the lab the natural evolution of the bacterial enzymes that confer resistance.
A team of scientists in Argentina and Mexico identified mutations that increased the efficiency of a bacter
Bacteria and humans use a number of tools to direct perhaps the most important function in cells — the accurate copying of DNA during cell division. New research published this week in Molecular Cell from the laboratory of Rockefeller University’s Michael O’Donnell, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, now shows that one of these proteins, the beta sliding clamp, serves as a toolbelt from which the correct proteins are retrieved to enable DNA replication in the face of DNA
Cornell University researchers have discovered the 3-D crystal structure of a protein, human CD38, which may lead to important discoveries about how cells release calcium — a mineral used in almost every cellular process. The findings also may offer insights into mechanisms involved in certain diseases, ranging from leukemia to diabetes and HIV-AIDS.
Levels of the protein climb, for reasons unknown, when people fall ill, making human CD38 a marker for these diseases.
A
Laboratory model missing one copy of Prox1 gene exhibits abnormal increase in fat accumulation around sites of lymph leakage from defective lymphatic vessels, according to St. Jude
Leaky lymphatic vessels are the leading cause of the adult onset obesity observed in a laboratory model developed by investigators at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The findings suggest that the abnormal leakage of lymph fluid from the ruptured lymphatic vessels stimulates the accumulat
Results advance quest for viral-based therapies for cancer
Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center continue to make strides in their work to develop the next generation of effective viral-based therapies for cancer. Two papers about promising research with genetically engineered viruses studied in mice, published today in the journals Cancer Research and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), bring us significantly closer to this objective and the s
A drug used for the treatment of sickle cell anemia in adults has now been shown to cause significant improvements in very young children with the disorder. The finding is an important one as these young patients are especially vulnerable to serious organ failure and even death at an early age. The study results will be published in the October 1, 2005, issue of Blood, the official journal of the American Society of Hematology.
Sickle cell anemia is a genetic blood disorder that
Compounds called defensins–known to prevent viruses from entering cells–appear to do so by preventing the virus from merging to cells’ outer membrane, according to a study by researchers at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, both of the National Institutes of Health, and the University of California at Los Angeles.
The study, appearing in the September 11 Nature Immunology, also received funding
Researchers find human fat cells produce C-reactive protein
Researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston have found that human fat cells produce a protein that is linked to both inflammation and an increased risk of heart disease and stroke.
They say the discovery, reported in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, goes a long way to explain why people who are overweight generally have
A team led by UCSD biochemists has discovered the mechanism by which a simple organism can produce 10 trillion varieties of a single protein, a finding that provides a new tool to develop novel drugs.
In the September 18 advance on-line publication of the journal Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, the researchers describe the mechanism by which a virus that infects bacteria—called a bacteriophage, or phage—can generate a kaleidoscope of variants of a particular protein.
Mayo Clinic research team has devised a new virus-based gene therapy delivery system to help fight cancer. Researchers say their findings will help overcome hurdles that have hindered gene therapy cancer treatments.
The Mayo research team, which includes a collaborator from the United Kingdom, describes its new approach in the current edition of Nature Medicine.
The approach relies on “therapeutic hitchhikers” — particles derived from retroviruses (RNA-containing viru
A new family of genes could hold the key to winning the battle against breast cancer, according to new research at the University of East Anglia.
Cancer specialists at UEA have discovered that several ‘ADAMTS’ genes are turned off in breast cancer compared to normal breast tissue, while others are switched on. These genes could be targets for the development of ‘smart’ drugs tailored to treat individual patients’ tumours.
The ADAMTS genes are recent additions to a larg
According to the most accepted theory on the origin of life, life began with very simple molecules, RNA chains, which were able to self-replicate. The problem with the theory, however, is that the fragility of these chains when there are replication errors (mutations) made it almost impossible for them to have evolved into more complex life forms. An international team of scientists, including Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona researchers, has discovered that these early molecules were much m
Water management is the key to regulating cell volume says Dutch researcher Bas Tomassen. He investigated the uptake and secretion of water by the plasma membrane of animal and human cells.
Cell volume is the outcome of a subtle balance between water uptake and secretion by the cell plasma membrane. A cell can regulate its volume by adjusting the salt concentrations in and around the cell. Exactly how this process works is still not known. Bas Tomassen has identified a number o
UCSD biochemists have developed a computer program that helps explain a long-standing mystery: how the same proteins can play different roles in a wide range of cellular processes, including those leading to immune responses and cancer.
Prior to the UCSD team’s findings, which are published in the September 16 issue of the journal Science, many scientists expressed doubts that a computational approach could represent the intricate mechanisms through which cells respond to outside
When Dr. Susan Rosenberg, professor of molecular and human genetics at Baylor College of Medicine, first published her finding that the mutation rate increased in bacteria stressed by starvation, sometimes resulting in a rare change that benefited the bacteria, it was controversial.
In a report in the current issue of the journal Molecular Cell, she and her colleagues describe not only how it happens but also show that this only occurs at a special time and place in the stres
Animal study shows potential for new therapies to aid drug-addiction recovery efforts
A novel chemical compound that blocks memory-related drug cravings has the potential to be the basis of new therapies to aid drug-addiction recovery efforts, UC Irvine neurobiologists have found.
Because exposure to people, places and objects previously associated with a drug habit can trigger overwhelming memory-based cravings, many former drug users often relapse into drug-taking be
Feedback
