How does the brain adapt our behavior in response to an infection or injury? A multidisciplinary team of scientists from the Institut Pasteur, CNRS and Inserm have revealed the existence of a circuit involved in sensing and also in the regulation of the anti-inflammatory response orchestrated by different brain regions. This circuit detects inflammation in the blood and organizes and regulates the immune response. It embodies a two-way connection between the brain and immune system. The results were published on…
The tiny crustaceans are the first new gnathiid isopod to be discovered from the Floridian ecoregion in 100 years and are named after singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett. An international team of scientists from the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science and the Water Research Group from the Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management at the North-West University in South Africa have discovered a new species of marine cryptofauna in the Florida Keys. Cryptofauna are the tiny,…
Enzymes play a key role in cellular metabolic processes. To enable the quantitative assessment of these processes, researchers need to know the so-called “turnover number” (for short: kcat) of the enzymes. In the scientific journal Nature Communications, a team of bioinformaticians from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) now describes a tool for predicting this parameter for various enzymes using AI methods. Enzymes are important biocatalysts in all living cells. They are normally large proteins, which bind smaller molecules – so-called…
Understanding the origins and preservation of biodiversity is crucial as human impact continues to threaten our planet’s rich variety of life. Often overlooked, narrow-ranged and evolutionary unique species play a vital role in shaping biodiversity. Their concentrated presence, quantified as phylogenetic endemism, reveals important centers of biogeographic and evolutionary history. A new study led by a team of international researchers at the University of Göttingen has now uncovered global patterns and factors influencing phylogenetic endemism in seed plants, providing invaluable…
Rhomboid proteases are a promising target for new drugs. Now researchers from the Leibniz-Forschungsinstitut für Molekulare Pharmakologie (FMP) have uncovered a mechanism for regulating enzyme activity. The key role is played by dynamics of the gate discovered a few years ago, which opens briefly when other proteins are cleaved. The results, based on various experimental and theoretical methods, have just been published in the Science Advances journal. They are located in the cell membrane and cleave other proteins, triggering a…
Around one third of people with heart disease suffer from sleep problems. In a paper published in the journal Science, a team at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) shows that heart diseases affect the production of the sleep hormone melatonin in the pineal gland. The link between the two organs is a ganglion in the neck region. The study demonstrates a previously unknown role of ganglia and points to possible treatments. The fact that melatonin levels can decrease in…
ISTA Scientists Successfully Model Cell Dynamics. Like us, cells communicate. Well, in their own special way. Using waves as their common language, cells tell one another where and when to move. They talk, they share information, and they work together – much like the interdisciplinary team of researchers from the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) and the National University of Singapore (NUS). They conducted research on how cells communicate – and how that matters to future projects, e.g….
… records deep-brain activity in rats, without surgery. A new ultra-small and ultra-flexible electronic neural implant, delivered via blood vessels, can record single-neuron activity deep within the brains of rats, according to new study. “This technology could enable long-term, minimally invasive bioelectronic interfaces with deep-brain regions“, writes Brian Timko in a related Perspective. Brain-machine interfaces (BMIs) enable direct electrical communication between the brain and external electronic systems. They allow brain activity to directly control devices such as prostheses or modulate…
Researchers use X-ray photocrystallography to capture the key Rh-acylnitrenoid intermediate, elucidating the transition metal-nitrenoid transfer process. Led by Director CHANG Sukbok, scientists from the Center for Catalytic Hydrocarbon Functionalizations within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS) have made a breakthrough in understanding the structure and reactivity of a key intermediate in catalytic reactions. This intermediate, known as a transition metal-nitrenoid, plays a crucial role in converting hydrocarbons into amides, which are important in pharmaceuticals and materials science. In chemical reactions,…
Researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago have identified a process by which enzymes can help prevent heart damage in chemotherapy patients. The enzymes are normally found in a cell’s mitochondria, the powerhouse that produces energy. But when heart cells are put under stress from certain types of chemotherapy drugs, the enzymes move into the cell’s nucleus, where they are able to keep the cells alive. The paper is published in Nature Communications. “As chemotherapy has become more and more effective,…
How to produce hydrogen cost-effectively and sustainably is one of the central questions of the energy transition. Highly conductive membranes for electrolyzers are a key component of hydrogen technology. A research team at Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Polymer Research IAP, together with Zentrum für Brennstoffzellen Technik ZBT GmbH, has now developed innovative anion exchange membranes (AEM) that allow to reduce the costs of electrolyzers and to tap the potential of hydrogen as a climate-neutral energy source in an environmentally friendly…
Pivotal role of DNA copy number. A study performed at IRB Barcelona unveils how the number of copies of genetic material influences the cell death processes that shape organs during development. Autophagy, which is a process related to the degradation and recycling of cellular components, plays a fundamental role in response to stress and cancer. The study has been published in the journal Autophagy. During development and associated processes, the programmed death of certain cells plays an essential role in…
New factor influencing excess body weight discovered. What determines whether we become overweight? Aside from lifestyle, predisposition plays a role, but genes cannot fully explain the inherited propensity to accumulate excess weight. A new study by Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin in Science Translational Medicine* shows that a kind of formatting of the DNA code in one gene that is associated with satiety is implicated in a slightly elevated risk of excess body weight – at least in women. This “epigenetic…
“Don’t eat me!” That’s how one might translate the signal that the cancer cells in a glioblastoma send to the macrophages (white blood cells specialized in removing dead and dying cellular matter) in the brain. Immunotherapy attempts to enable these cells to eradicate the abnormal cells, but so far, it has met with little success when it comes to glioblastomas. Researchers led by Professor Gregor Hutter from the Department of Biomedicine at the University and University Hospital Basel have recently…
There is news from the immune system: Dendritic cells migrate in a network along the outside of blood vessels. Local cytokines keep this dynamic network stable. The cells of the immune system circulate mainly in the blood and migrate into the body’s tissues after an inflammation. Some types of immune cells, however, are permanently located in the tissues, where they come together to form three-dimensional networks. How do these networks form and how are they maintained? For the long-lived macrophages…
Omicron variants are responsible for most COVID-19 infections worldwide. Compared to earlier virus variants, Omicron causes severe diseases less frequently. However, an international team including scientists from the German Primate Center – Leibniz Institute for Primate Research has now identified a mutation in the spike protein of the Omicron subvariant BA.5 that enables the virus to efficiently infect lung cells again. The study shows that in the future, Omicron subvariants may emerge that could again effectively infect lung cells and…
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