LMO4 Enhances T Cell Cancer-Fighting Abilities. Researchers at the Leibniz Institute for Immunotherapy (LIT), University Hospital Regensburg (UKR) and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) have engineered CD8+ T cells to artificially express the gene LMO4, thereby enhancing their effectiveness against tumors. T cell therapies, which use genetically engineered T cells of the human immune system as therapeutics, are revolutionizing medical oncology by effectively treating previously incurable blood cancers. However, their success against solid tumors has been limited….
Researchers from the RIKEN Center for Computational Science (Japan) and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology (Germany) have published new findings on how social norms evolve over time. They simulated how norms promote different social behavior, and how the norms themselves come and go. Because of the enormous number of possible norms, these simulations were run on RIKEN’s Fugaku, one of the fastest supercomputers worldwide. Models of indirect reciprocity describe how social norms promote cooperation. This literature stipulates that…
… could lead to more effective and efficient water purification systems. Novel approach significantly enhances the speed and efficiency of membrane production, offering promising solutions for water purification challenges. A team of NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) researchers has developed a novel approach that utilizes microwave technology to more easily synthesize and fine-tune a new type of membrane which effectively purifies water from a wide range of contaminants. The membrane synthesis technique takes a few minutes, making it one of the…
Around half of the human genome is composed of DNA fragments originating from ancient viruses. These “transposable elements” (TEs) are now known to play various roles in modulating gene expression and disease development. Now, an international team led by KAUST researchers has shown that a common transposable element called LINE-1 RNA plays a positive role in triggering bone repair, with potential applications in treating osteoporosis and many other diseases[1]. “Once termed ‘junk DNA,’ scientists thought that TEs were irrelevant or…
Findings can be used to accelerate the creation of female stem cell lines in mice and boost efforts in medical research, drug testing, and regenerative therapies. Researchers at the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) have discovered a treatment which accelerates the production and quality of pluripotent stem cells in mice. This discovery that has the potential to improve disease modelling and drug testing for individuals with two X chromosomes; women, transgender men or men with an extra X chromosome in…
Researchers at Michigan State University have discovered two proteins that work together to determine the fate of cells in plants facing certain stresses. Ironically, a key discovery in this finding, published recently in Nature Communications, was made right as the project’s leader was getting ready to destress. A Michigan State University researcher carefully plates Arabidopsis seeds, which consists of placing seeds in water and dropping them one at a time onto a plate with a growth substrate. Once the seeds sprout,…
New approach for the production of resource-saving and durable catalysts benefits from varying interactions between noble metals and different carrier materials. The Objective: Best Possible Catalytic Performance Noble-metal catalysts are used in many processes in the chemical industry. A reduction of the amount of noble metal required for their production is an important contribution to a sustainable resource use. “Our approach will significantly improve the catalyst stability and ensure the formation of active noble-metal clusters even with a very low…
A team of researchers from the lab of Prof. Stein Aerts (VIB-KU Leuven) presents Nova-ST, a new spatial transcriptomics technique that promises to transform gene expression profiling in tissue samples. Nova-ST will make large-scale, high-resolution spatial tissue analysis more accessible and affordable, offering significant benefits for researchers. The research was published in Cell Reports Methods. Transcriptomics is the study of gene expression in a cell or a population of cells, but it usually does not include spatial information about where…
New technique from the CNSI at UCLA may lead to design approaches that optimize the performance of chemical reactions. The chemical and energy industries depend upon catalysts to drive the reactions used to create their products. Many important reactions use heterogeneous catalysts — meaning that the catalysts are in a different phase of matter than the substances they are reacting with, such as solid platinum reacting with gases in an automobile’s catalytic converter. Scientists have investigated the surface of well-defined…
Researchers at the University of California, Davis have developed a rapid, noninvasive tool to track the neurons and biomolecules activated in the brain by psychedelic drugs. The protein-based tool, which is called Ca2+-activated Split-TurboID, or CaST, is described in research published in Nature Methods. There has been mounting interest in the value of psychedelic-inspired compounds as treatments for brain disorders including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and substance use disorder. Psychedelic compounds like LSD, DMT and psilocybin promote the growth and strengthening of…
Research team at the University of Göttingen develops method for recognizing cell properties. Checking whether an avocado is hard or soft by looking at it? This would require recognizing how the plant cells behave behind the skin. The same applies to all other cells on our planet: Despite more than 100 years of intensive research, many of their properties remain hidden inside the cell. Researchers at the University of Göttingen describe in their recent publication in Nature Materials a new…
Optimizing CAR-T Cells with CRISPR 2.0. As part of the German Research Foundation (DFG) Emmy Noether Program, Dr. Karl Petri is establishing a research group at the University Hospital Würzburg (UKW) to develop and enhance novel CRISPR 2.0 tools for generating and improving cancer-targeted CAR-T cell products. Würzburg. CAR-T cells are highly effective in treating selected blood cancers. However, challenges remain with this new therapy, which was first approved in 2017 in the USA and a year later in Europe…
The origins of life remain a major mystery. How were complex molecules able to form and remain intact for prolonged periods without disintegrating? A team at ORIGINS, a Munich-based Cluster of Excellence, has demonstrated a mechanism that could have enabled the first RNA molecules to stabilize in the primordial soup. When two RNA strands combine, their stability and lifespan increase significantly. In all likelihood, life on Earth began in water, perhaps in a tide pool that was cut off from…
Finding unknown effects of existing drugs. Fewer side effects, improved chances of healing: the goal of precision medicine is to provide patients with the most individualized treatment possible. This requires a precise understanding of what is happening at the cellular level. For the first time, researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have now succeeded in mapping the interactions of 144 active substances with around 8,000 proteins. The results could help to identify previously unknown potential benefits of existing…
Ancient ocean temperatures are most commonly reconstructed by analysing the ratio of different oxygen atoms in the calcium carbonate remains of fossils. However, this presents many challenges, including a combination of biological processes known as “vital effects” which are very noticeable in corals and can affect the data. A research team led by the University of Göttingen now shows how the abundance of a third, very rare oxygen isotope can uncover whether the isotopic composition was solely influenced by temperature…
Transmission of tuberculosis does not only depend on the pathogen. Different groups of TB bacteria exist worldwide with different regional distribution: some are generalists and can be found on many continents, others are very limited in their spread. An international team of researchers has now been able to show for the first time that the specialist strains spread more effectively among suitable hosts from the same geographical area, whereas generalist strains can spread in different host populations from a variety…
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