In an attempt to find new regulators of the immune system, a team of researchers at Rigel Pharmaceuticals, Inc. have created a successful method for discovering molecules that are involved in signalling pathways. As published this week in the Journal of Biology, the team conducted a functional genome-wide screen and discovered novel modulators of T-cell receptor signalling that could aid in the development of drugs that target the immune response.
T cells are an integral part of the immune r
Intervention in the process whereby genes are turned “on” or “off” has been demonstrated by scientists at the Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical School. The work offers promise for future genetic treatment to control undesirable tissue growth, such as in cancer.
The experimental work of the group is described in a recent article in the journal, Nature Genetics. The researchers succeeded in showing how manipulation of the methylation process in animals can turn genes which are normally inacti
The meaning and nature of change is a question that has fascinated some of the world’s greatest minds since long before the birth of Christ. Today, legions of philosophers and hosts of cognitive scientists continue to work to resolve what may be one of the world’s greatest paradoxes: How is it that change and constancy coexist in the world and in the human mind? Binghamton University Professor Eric Dietrich is sure of at least one thing. Our creativity, and likely our very survival, depends on the f
Plus surprising differences in ’Normal’ DNA
Researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory have developed one of the most sensitive, comprehensive, and robust methods that now exists for profiling the genetic basis of cancer and other diseases. The method detects chromosomal deletions and amplifications (i.e. missing or excess copies of DNA segments), and is useful for a wide variety of biomedical and other applications.
The study, led by Rob Lucito and Michael Wigler, is pub
The functional development of hair cells in the inner ear that mediate hearing and balance takes place over a period of just one day in mouse embryos, according to a study by a research team at the University of Virginia Health System.
The U.Va. scientists found that three essential elements for development in the mouse inner ear appear between day 16 and day 17 of gestation, roughly equivalent to the late second trimester or early third trimester in the human fetus. The finding is importan
New nerve cells put fall foraging on fast track
The “senior moments” that herald old age, and the ability to forget where we put something we held in our hands just moments ago, give us humans much cause to envy a species like the black-capped chickadee.
Especially when fall is right around the corner.
Every autumn, the chickadee roams a territory covering tens of square miles, gathering seeds and storing them in hundreds of hiding places in trees and on the ground. Ove
The 35,000 or so genes within a human cell are something like players on a sports team: If their activity isn’t controlled and coordinated, the result can be disastrous.
So just as coaches tell individual players when to scramble onto the field and when to stay on the bench, molecules called transcription factors prompt particular genes to be active or stay quiet. Transcription factors occur naturally in cells, but researchers have been working to develop artificial transcriptio
Rice, UIUC researchers find way to separate metallic, non-metallic nanotubes
Researchers at Rice University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have discovered the first method to chemically select and separate carbon nanotubes based on their electronic structure. The new process, described in the Sept. 12 issue of Science magazine, represents a fundamental shift in the way scientists think about the chemistry of carbon nanotubes.
“Other than low-cost mass prod
Scientists at the U.S Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory are exploring the use of bacteria to increase the recovery of methane, a clean natural gas, from coal beds, and to decontaminate water produced during the methane-recovery process.
Methane gas, which burns without releasing sulfur contaminants, is becoming increasingly important as a natural gas fuel in the U.S. But the process of recovering methane, which is often trapped within porous, unrecovered or waste co
NSF-funded study suggests paternal care may be ancient trait in primates
In a finding that surprised researchers, a recent three-year study of five baboon groups at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro in Kenya reveals that baboon fathers overwhelming side with their offspring when intervening in disputes.
The study, which appears in the Sept. 11 issue of the journal Nature, was funded by the National Science Foundation, the Chicago Zoological Society, the L.S.B. Leakey Foundati
Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) in Boston and Jefferson Medical College have found that the body’s natural biological clock is more sensitive to shorter wavelength blue light than it is to the longer wavelength green light, which is needed to see.
The discovery proves what scientists have suspected over the last decade: a second, non-visual photoreceptor system drives the body’s internal clock, which sets sleep patterns and other physiological and behavioral functions.
After more than a century of intensive study, scientists have assumed that larvae of non-parasitic invertebrates reproduce only very rarely, but new research by University of Alberta scientists overthrows this conventional wisdom. Graduate student Alexandra Eaves and Dr. Richard Palmer, from the U of A’s Faculty of Science, have found that asexual cloning by some marine invertebrate larvae is not as rare and enigmatic a phenomenon as previously assumed.
“A wealth of knowledge of how em
Scientists at Ohio State University have found a way to boost the light absorption of a metal mesh up to 1000 times, possibly paving the way for powerful chemical sensors and laboratory instruments.
Key to the technology is a new coating technique that enables the mesh to capture and transmit more light through its microscopic holes than would normally be possible.
James V. Coe, associate professor of chemistry at Ohio State, and his colleagues also found that if they coated the mes
Dirt may help scientists answer a question that has baffled them for decades: How does chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer and elk spread from animal to animal?
By turning to the land, University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers show that prions – infectious proteins considered to be at the root of the disease – literally stick to some soil types, suggesting that the landscape may serve as an environmental reservoir for the disease.
The findings will be discussed during a poste
For the first time in any animal, Duke University Medical Center researchers have linked a single pheromone receptor in the fruit fly to a specific sexual behavior.
Pheromones are chemical signals exuded by many animals — including humans — that serve as stimuli to evoke behavioral responses in other individuals of the same species. Pheromones often attract members of the opposite sex and provide important cues during courtship and mating.
Yet little is known about pheromone re
Scientists studying the conversion of carbon dioxide (CO2) to carbon monoxide (CO) — a crucial step in transforming CO2 to useful organic compounds such as methanol — are trying to mimic what plants do when they convert CO2 and water to carbohydrates and oxygen in the presence of chlorophyll and sunlight. Such “artificial photosynthesis” could produce inexpensive fuels and raw materials for the chemical industry from renewable solar energy. But achieving this goal is no simple task.
“Natu
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