Investigators at the Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA examining responses to cocaine and methamphetamine use find distinct differences in onset, pattern and duration.
Subjective, or self-reported, responses to cocaine peak and decline more rapidly than those of methamphetamine, the study shows. Cardiovascular responses to the two stimulants are similar at onset but responses to cocaine decline more rapidly.
In press with the pee
Discovery has implications for control of mosquitoes, malaria and West Nile Virus
Prior to coming to Nevada 16 years ago, David Schooley was a key figure at a small company in Palo Alto, Calif. that developed methoprene, an insecticide that halts the maturation of insect larvae to adults.
Methoprene, which has the same effect as an insect hormone called juvenile hormone, also stops the insect from reproducing. It is being used heavily throughout the United S
The first clinical trial of a biologic nanoparticle designed to give back to cancer patients the tumor-busting gene they have lost is expected to start in September at Georgetown University Medical Center.
The phase I clinical study will enroll 20 patients with advanced solid cancers (including most common tumor types), and is the culmination of more than a decade of work by a team of researchers led by Professor Esther H. Chang, Ph.D. at the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Ce
Carrying the right bacterial hitchhiker can make the difference between life and death for an aphid.
Pea aphids are often under attack by wasps seeking to lay their eggs inside aphids, turning them into an all-you-can-eat buffet for the larval wasps.
The aphids vary in their resistance to the wasps, which scientists had chalked up to genetic differences between aphids.
But it’s not in their genes at all — the wasp-resistant aphids owe their lives to the
Findings could lead to new types of therapeutic RNAs for cancer, genetic diseases
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have published the first study to test the role of RNA chemical modifications on immunity. They have demonstrated that RNA from bacteria stimulates immune cells to orchestrate destruction of invading pathogens. Most RNA from human cells is recognized as being self and does not stimulate an immune response to the same extent as invading
Engineered bug makes key chemical precursor from grain sorghum
Trials have begun in Kansas on a “green” production method for succinate, a key ingredient of many plastics, drugs, solvents and food additives. Developed at Rice University, the technology uses a genetically modified form of the bacteria E. coli that metabolizes glucose and produces almost pure succinate.
Finding “green” methods to make key chemical intermediates like succinate is a high priority for the
Genetic finding may have implications for farsightedness and nearsightedness, too.
Working with an Amish-Mennonite family tree, Johns Hopkins researchers at the Wilmer Eye Institute have discovered what appears to be the first human gene mutation that causes extreme farsightedness.
The researchers report that nanophthalmos, Greek for “dwarf eye,” is a rare, potentially blinding disorder caused by an alteration in a gene called MFRP that helps control eye growth and regulate
Neuroscientists from the University at Buffalo have described for the first time how rotenone, an environmental toxin linked specifically to Parkinson’s disease, selectively destroys the neurons that produce dopamine, the neurotransmitter critical to body movement and muscle control.
Microtubules, intracellular highways that transport dopamine to the brain area that controls body movement, are the crucial target, they report.
Damage to microtubules prevents dopa
National Institute on Aging (NIA) researchers have discovered a new gene, FANCM, which sheds light on an important pathway involved in the repair of damaged DNA. Specifically, mutation in this gene is responsible for one of the forms of Fanconi anemia (FA), a rare genetic disorder that primarily affects children. Like many rare, inherited diseases, understanding this gene’s role in the development of FA provides insights into other medical problems — in this case, age-related conditions includi
French scientists have learned how Listeria monocytogenes, which causes a major food-borne illness, commandeers cellular transport machinery to invade cells and hide from the body’s immune system. They believe that other infectious organisms may use the same mechanism.
The Listeria bacterium, found in soil and water, can be transmitted to humans via undercooked and unpasteurized food, causing flu-like symptoms or gastrointestinal distress. For individuals with weakened immune sy
Researchers have developed a new technique for creating human embryonic stem cells by fusing adult somatic cells with embryonic stem cells. The fusion causes the adult cells to undergo genetic reprogramming, which results in cells that have the developmental characteristics of human embryonic stem cells.
This approach could become an alternative to somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), a method that is currently used to produce human stem cells. SCNT involves transferring the nu
Research in monkeys suggests that a new drug can temporarily improve performance and reverse the effects of sleep deprivation on the brain, which would be a breakthrough in helping shift workers, health professionals, military personnel and others who must function at top performance in spite of sleep deficits.
“In addition to improving performance under normal conditions, the drug restored performance that was impaired after sleep loss,” said Samuel Deadwyler, Ph.D., senior rese
Warm-blooded creatures maintain a relatively stable body temperature that cannot tolerate the stress of intense heat (or cold). When it’s too hot proteins destabilize and degrade–in some cases, with fatal results. But some bacterial and archaeal organisms appear to defy nature (as we think of it) by flourishing in extremely high temperatures. The archaeal microbe Pyrobaculum aerophilum, for example–originally found in a boiling marine water hole in Italy–thrives at ~100 °C (212 °F).
Protein thought to promote lymphoma by merely preventing cancer cells from dying appears to actively promote cancer cell growth
A protein previously thought to merely hinder the activity of a key cellular protein linked to cancer cell death, now appears to mimic the cellular signaling of that protein; potentially leading to the development of lymphoma. The findings, published in the Aug. 22 online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), demonstrate that
A forthcoming paper in the international, open-access journal PLoS Medicine makes the strongest association yet between a newly identified virus and the pediatric respiratory disease commonly known as croup. Following their recent description of the coronavirus HCoV-NL63, Lia van der Hoek and colleagues suggest this is one of the most frequently detected viruses in children with lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs). These infections are estimated by the World Health Organization to be re
In a step that advances our ability to discern the ancient evolutionary relationships between different genes and their biological functions, researchers have provided insight into the present-day outcome of a single gene duplication that occurred over a hundred million years ago in an ancestor of modern plants. The work is reported in Current Biology by a team led by Brendan Davies of the University of Leeds, England.
Gene duplication–a relatively uncommon event in which a single co
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