New molecular technologies, some driven by the work of a researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, are exposing unexpectedly high levels of DNA folding and complex protein-rich assemblages within the nucleus of cells that he says “seriously challenge the textbook models.”
“What we are seeing suggests that there may be machinery, not yet identified, that controls the folding and the movements of enzymes that turn genes on and off,” said Andrew Belmont, a professor of cell
Researchers from Imperial College London, University of Oxford, Kagoshima University (Japan) and University of the Ryukyus (Japan) have discovered the mechanism by which human T-lymphotropic virus type 1 (HTLV-1), the virus which causes adult T-cell leukaemia, spreads through the body.
Previously it was not understood how HTLV-1 was able to spread between cells and pass between individuals, but according to research published today in Science, the virus spreads by subverting normal T-cell (a
Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers are beginning to unravel how a mysterious sixth sense guides animal attraction. The scientists have made the first-ever recordings of patterns of brain activity in a mouse as it explores the sex and identity of a newly encountered animal.
The research team, led by Lawrence C. Katz, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Duke University Medical Center, recorded the firing of neurons in the accessory olfactory bulb, part of a poorly under
When it comes to visual entertainment, three-dimensional viewing can be quite eye-opening. So, too, in science where a recent finding involving University of Iowa researchers used three-dimensional imaging to understand how a bacterial enzyme can take oxygen from air and use it to convert certain molecules into useful chemicals.
Specifically, the scientists saw that naphthalene dioxygenase, a bacterial enzyme, can bind oxygen (to iron) in a side-on fashion and add it on to naphthalene, a hy
If you sniff a rose this Valentine’s Day, your brain will recognize almost a hundred different molecules that collectively give the flower its heady scent-but how? Scientists are now discovering how the brain identifies odors and their mysterious counterparts, the pheromones. New research, to be presented today at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Annual Meeting and forthcoming in the journal, Science, explains how the mouse brain is exquisitely tuned to recognize an
Trees are better off if they produce large nuts. This is revealed in research by Patrick Jansen from Wageningen University. Scatterhoarding rodents appear to prefer burying larger nuts for later. The bigger the nut, the further it is buried from the tree and the more frequently it is forgotten.
Biologist Patrick Jansen investigated what happened to nuts as soon as they fell on the ground of the rainforest in French Guyana. He placed thousands of nuts on the ground in the forest. Each nut wa
Ames Laboratory researcher’s microscale channels steer neurons to rewire damaged nerves
Using microscale channels cut in an ultrathin biodegradable polymer, a researcher at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory is working to regrow nerve cells. The technique, which may one day allow the paralyzed to walk and the blind to see, has been proven to work for peripheral nerve regeneration in laboratory rats.
Nerve cells are unlike most other biological tissue. When a
The number of circulating endothelial progenitor cells in an individual’s blood –– the precursor cells to those that line the insides of blood vessels –– may be an indicator of overall cardiovascular health, according to research by scientists at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) and Emory University School of Medicine. The research was published in the Feb. 13 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
The endothelial cells lining the blood vessels provide essen
Answer one of natural history’s most intractable questions
All of Madagascar’s living Carnivora (an order of mammals that includes dogs, cats, bears, hyenas and their relatives) descended from a single species that dispersed from Africa to Madagascar, apparently floating across the ocean barrier aboard wayward vegetation about 24 million to 18 million years ago. Previously, scientists believed that Madagascar’s seven living species of native Carnivora represented two to four
A gene discovered by Temple University researchers a decade ago has proved to be multi-functional, with the discovery of its important roles in cell differentiation, HIV transcription, and tumorigenesis.
Cdk9 (cyclin-dependent kinases) and cdk10 were originally isolated by Antonio Giordano, M.D., Ph.D., then a researcher in Temple’s Fels Cancer Institute, and his team in 1992. They are members of a family of kinases originally referred to as a PITALRE, which is the name of the amino aci
Researchers in Oxford University’s Department of Inorganic Chemistry have devised a novel method for separating polar organic compounds, providing a useful alternative to the usual methods of chromatography or crystallisation.
The separation of mixtures of organic and inorganic compounds is of considerable importance in most areas of industrial and academic chemistry. In particular, isomeric mixtures are often difficult to separate and can require highly specialised techniques.
Con
Researchers in Oxford University’s Department of Inorganic Chemistry have devised a method for the selective separation and recovery of nucleoside phosphates from complex reaction mixtures using Layered Double Hydroxide (LDH) materials.
Nucleoside phosphates are used extensively in industry as intermediates or additives in nutraceutical and pharmaceutical preparation, as well as in medical and separation science. In particular many new antiviral agents are based on nucleosides. Supplying the
A Duke University Medical Center neurobiologist has identified key mechanisms by which the intricate “protein machines” that govern the strength of connections among neurons build and remodel themselves to adjust those connections.
Such remodeling of the connections, called synapses, is central to the establishment of brain pathways during learning and memory, said the scientists. Also, malfunction of the synaptic machinery might well play a fundamental role in the pathology of neurodegenera
The technique that helped revolutionize modern biology by making the mouse a crucible of genetic manipulation and a window to human disease has been extended to human embryonic stem (ES) cells.
In a study published today (Feb. 10) in the online editions of the journal Nature Biotechnology, a team of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison reports that it has developed methods for recombining segments of DNA within stem cells.
By bringing to bear the technique, known in
Fat is not only a much-discussed food substance. Fat can also function as a signal substance in the body and activate a special receptor in the cells of important organs like the heart and liver. This opens opportunities for new ways of explaining the genesis of diabetes, a disease that is strongly associated with obesity.
This new role for fat was discovered by a team of researchers headed by Professor Christer Owman and Associate Professor Björn Old of the Wallenberg Neuroscience Center at
Imagine information stored on something only a hundredth the size of the next generation computer chip–and made from nature’s own storage molecule, DNA. A team led by Richard Kiehl, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Minnesota, has used the selective “stickiness” of DNA to construct a scaffolding for closely spaced nanoparticles that could exchange information on a scale of only 10 angstroms (an angstrom is one 10-billionth of a meter). The technique allows the assembly
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