’A genomic approach to the identification of genetic and environmental components underlying the quality of the grape’. This is the title of the R+D project financed by Genoma España in which the Department of Vegetable Physiology of the Faculty of Sciences at the University of Navarre is participating.
Over the next three years the Fundación Genoma España will provide two million euros to identify the genes responsible for the quality of grapes. Six research teams are working on a dessert
Several mammal species other than ruminants and camels have a multi-chambered forestomach – kangaroos, hippos, colobus monkeys, peccaries, sloths – but they do not ruminate.
As studies on the digestive physiology of these species are largely missing, it is generally assumed that their forestomach functions in the same way as that of ruminants, the most prominent characteristic of which is the selective retention of larger particles. However, retaining larger particles (which are more
It all started with an aquarium his father bought for the family home in Venezuela. The fish swam and ate and created an environment that captivated the watchful eye of then-10-year-old Hernan Lopez-Fernandez.
“One of the first fish of my own was called a Texas Cichlid,” Lopez-Fernandez said. “I was hooked on fish.”
Little did the young South American boy realize the role Texas would play in his life. Now a doctoral student in Texas A&M University’s wildlife and fisheries sci
Gene cassettes using self-cleaving peptides allowed T lymphocytes to construct a key multi-protein immune receptor complex
A genetic trick used by viruses to replicate themselves has been adapted for laboratory use to build complex protein structures required by immune system cells, according to investigators at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
This approach could also be used to develop new gene therapy vectors in cases when cells must be modified to make high le
A certain species of tick has learned the secret to staying slim–by remaining virgins. Female ticks who mate will drink 100 times their weight in host blood, whereas virgins aren’t so gluttonous says a University of Alberta researcher who has discovered a protein that may offer clues to a $10 billion global tick problem.
“What happens is that a female will remain attached to a host, eating slowly and waiting to be fertilized,” said Dr. Reuben Kaufman from the U of A’s Faculty of
Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas are the first to use genetically engineered mice containing a fluorescent molecule to examine in real time the chemical reactions that result in smooth-muscle contraction.
Smooth muscle, found in the walls of blood vessels and in internal organs such as lungs, stomach and the bladder, contracts as the end result of a series of chemical reactions. In a new study, UT Southwestern researchers report that one set of chemical reactions resu
New Caledonian crows, known to be very proficient tool-users, have a preferred way of holding their tools comparable to the way humans are either right- or left-handed, according to research by Oxford zoologists, recently published in ’Biology Letters’.
Studying the tool use of 10 captive New Caledonian crows, the researchers found that each bird had a consistent preference for holding a piece of dowelling either near its left or its right cheek when trying to retrieve mealworms f
Just when you thought it was safe to go to bed, the bed-bug is returning to UK cities
Many urban infesting organisms are in decline. Worryingly, the bed-bug is bucking this trend. One London borough has seen infestations increase nearly ten-fold in the last ten years.
Bed-bugs are not known to spread any diseases, but their bites are a severe nuisance. Would you like to share your home with this ancient bedfellow? And the current trend is especially worrying to hoteliers (n
A team of researchers from the University Hospital of Grenoble (CHU – Inserm U647) and the ESRF1 has found a new treatment that improves the survival of rats with high-grade gliomas.
This research was carried out at the ESRF Medical Beamline. It showed that after a year of this treatment, three rats out of 10 were considered cured, whereas without treatment, all would be dead. The results have just been published in the scientific journal Cancer Research. A glioma is one of the most frequen
A gene-switching mechanism dating back 400 million years to the very first plants that made it onto land has been found by plant biologists at UC Davis. A family of genes required for stem and leaf development in flowering plants is controlled in the same way in everything from mosses to a Douglas fir, according to postdoctoral researcher Sandra Floyd and John Bowman, professor of plant biology at UC Davis.
The mechanism depends on microRNAs, short pieces of RNA that switch genes off by int
The work of two scientists over the last decade has almost doubled the number of described Australian semi-aquatic bug species.
With an estimated two thirds of Australia’s insects yet to be scientifically described, documenting and recording new species is no easy task.
Identifying the new species of semi-aquatic bugs saw Tom Weir, CSIRO Entomology, and Nils Andersen, Copenhagen University, examine more than 45,000 specimens from around Australia.
“Despite living on
Scientists have discovered that the heart of a carp keeps beating when it is starved of oxygen for five days. “This is the first time that a vertebrate heart has been shown to survive such prolonged periods without oxygen and actually keep beating at the same rate as when oxygen is available” says Jonathan Stecyk (Simon Fraser University), presenting his latest results at the annual SEB meeting in Edinburgh this week.
“If I were to take oxygen away from your heart it would die in two minutes
Protein molecules that help maintain a healthy body temperature, electrolyte balance, respiration, heart rate, and other critical functions, also appear to regulate weight and fertility, according to Yale researchers.
STAT3 proteins are regulatory molecules that signal cell functions for activating genes. When the STAT3 molecules are disrupted in mice, the animals either die before they are born, or overeat and become obese, diabetic and infertile, according to the study published in the Pro
When the gene, called Foxm1b, was deleted from liver cells in laboratory mice, the animals failed to develop tumors. Even when the researchers attempted to induce the formation of these tumors artificially, using a standard laboratory technique, the mice remained cancer free.
“To my knowledge, this is the first time a gene has been directly linked to the growth of cancer cells in live animals,” said Robert Costa, professor of biochemistry and molecular genetics in the UIC College of Medicine
Scientists have generated and begun to analyze the rat genome, paving the way for comparisons with the two other mammalian genomes sequenced so far — human, and mouse. The primary results of the Rat Genome Sequencing Project Consortium (RGSPC) are presented in the April 1 issue of Nature, and an additional thirty manuscripts describing further detailed analyses are contained in the April issue of the journal Genome Research.
The cover image of Genome Research (see end of release) was produ
Lab discovers way to keep short-lived catalysts active for longer than five months
Enzymes, the workhorses of chemical reactions in cells, lead short and brutal lives. They cleave and assemble proteins and metabolize compounds for a few hours, and then they are spent.
This sad fact of nature has limited the possibilities of harnessing enzymes as catalytic tools outside the cell, in uses that range from biosensing to toxic waste cleanup.
To increase the enzyme’s lon
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