Two Brown Medical School biologists have figured out the fate of healthy protein when it comes in contact with the infectious prion form in yeast: The protein converts to the prion form, rendering it infectious. In an instant, good protein goes bad.
This quick-change “mating” maneuver sheds important light on the mysterious molecular machinery behind prions, infectious proteins that cause fatal brain ailments such as mad cow disease and scrapie in animals and, in rare cases, Creut
In many patients with type 2 diabetes, the liver acts like a sugar factory on overtime, churning out glucose throughout the day, even when blood sugar levels are high. Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies discovered a key cellular switch that controls glucose production in liver cells.
This switch may be a potential new target for the development of highly specific diabetes drugs that signal the liver to reduce the production of sugar. The Salk researcher
Researchers have found that an important chemical compound, nitric oxide, appears to slow or reverse the aging of eggs in mouse ovaries. The finding suggests nitric oxide could one day help women in their 30s and 40s remain fertile longer and increase their chances of having healthy babies, the scientists say.
The finding, by investigators at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit, was published in the Aug. 30 issue of the American Chemical Society’s journal B
A type of chromosome change that was thought to predict a good response to treatment in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) might actually signal the need for a different therapy to achieve the best outcome. The findings from this new study may alert doctors that they need to change their treatment approach for certain AML patients .
The study compared AML patients whose cancer cells showed chromosome changes known as the 8;21 translocation with patients whose cancer cells
A new drug may help cancer patients mobilize the cells necessary to restore their blood-forming system after high-dose chemotherapy, according to results from a clinical trial at the Kimmel Cancer Center at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia and at other centers across the nation.
In the phase II trial, researchers were attempting to determine if patients with multiple myeloma or non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma who received the drug AMD-3100 along with the standard
Findings by Geri Richmond’s team provide insight for environmental challenges
Chemists have discovered details about how the tadpole-shaped molecules found in many soaps and detergents bury their heads into the top-most surface of water, an insight expected to yield benefits such as better methods for cleaning up environmental hazards. The findings of a team led by University of Oregon chemist Geri Richmond are featured on the cover of the Sept. 8 issue of the Journal of Physi
Flavour, texture and shelf life of wheat bread improved
Recent research carried out at the Technical Research Centre of Finland (VTT) indicates that sourdough, which is traditionally used for baking rye bread, can also be used for making tasty, high-fibre wheat bread with a prolonged shelf life. A seven-year research project conducted at VTT shows that optimising the sourdough process by fermenting bran with yeast and lactic acid bacteria makes it possible to produce mildly sour w
A key technological breakthrough led by the University of Edinburgh suggests that a futuristic world where people can move objects about ‘remotely’ with laser pointers could be closer than we think. Chemists working on the nanoscale (80,000 times smaller than a hair’s breadth) have managed to move a tiny droplet of liquid across a surface – and even up a slope – by transporting it along a layer of light-sensitive molecules.
Scientists at Edinburgh, Groningen and Bologna are the first to ma
A major advance in nanotechnology with far-reaching potential benefits in medicine and other fields is to be announced at this year’s BA Festival of Science in Dublin.
Scientists have built molecules that can, for the first time ever, move larger-than-atom-sized objects. Constructing molecular machines capable of performing relatively large-scale mechanical tasks has never been achieved before.
Now, in an unprecedented breakthrough, chemists at Edinburgh University have
Smoking appears to reduce a key enzyme in the lungs, possibly contributing to some of smoking’s deleterious health effects, according to a study published in the September issue of the Journal of Nuclear Medicine. The study, which used a radiotracer to track the enzyme, also shows that smokers had a lower concentration of the tracer in the bloodstream than nonsmokers did, leading to speculation that smokers and nonsmokers may respond differently to a variety of substances administered by inhala
By experimentally relocating migratory white-crowned sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys gambelii) from their breeding area in the Canadian Northwest Territories to regions at and around the magnetic North Pole, researchers have gained new insight into how birds navigate in the high Arctic. In particular, the findings aid our understanding of how birds might determine longitudinal information–a challenging task, especially at the earth’s poles.
The work is reported in Current Bi
In findings that support a relationship between agricultural chemicals and Parkinson’s disease, two groups of researchers have found new evidence that loss of DJ-1, a gene known to be linked to inherited Parkinson’s disease, leads to striking sensitivity to the herbicide paraquat and the insecticide rotenone. The two studies were performed with the fruit fly Drosophila, a widely used model organism for studies of human disease, and shed new light on biological connections between inheri
Duke University Medical Center researchers have found that the naturally occurring marine toxin domoic acid can cause subtle but lasting cognitive damage in rats exposed to the chemical before birth. Humans can become poisoned by the potentially lethal, algal toxin after eating contaminated shellfish.
The researchers saw behavioral effects of the toxin in animals after prenatal exposure to domoic acid levels below those generally deemed safe for adults, said Edward Levin, Ph.D.
Four sugar-coated faces made by stem cells as they differentiate into brain cells during development have been identified by scientists.
These unique expressions of sugar on the cell surface may one day enable stem cell therapy to repair brain injury or disease by helping stem cells navigate the relative “jungle” of the adult brain, says Dr. Robert K. Yu, director of the Institute of Neuroscience and the Institute for Molecular Medicine and Genetics at the Medical College of Geor
A group of researchers from Mexico has discovered that a diet rich in soy protein may alleviate fatty liver, a disease which often accompanies diabetes. The details of their findings appear in the September issue of the Journal of Lipid Research, an American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology journal.
The high levels of insulin and insulin-resistance that accompany diabetes are often associated with fatty liver or hepatic steatosis, an untreatable condition that c
UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers are the first to create a large-scale, cell-based screening method that identifies which compounds activate immune-response cells that hold promise for future cancer-fighting vaccines.
The new screening technique can scan thousands and even millions of compounds to identify those that activate dendritic cells, which are on constant recon patrol throughout the body to scout out cancerous or infected cells and alert the immune system.
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