SPRIND to finance spin-off Plectonic. Plectonic Biotech, a spin-off of the Technical University of Munich (TUM), has developed a nanoswitch that binds immune cells to tumor cells. The goal is to facilitate the development of immunotherapies that target tumors specifically and have fewer side effects. The German Federal Agency for Disruptive Innovation SPRIND will provide funding for the work of Plectonic Biotech in the coming years. Immunotherapies are regarded as one of the most promising approaches to cancer treatment in…

Hearing-impaired people whose auditory nerve is still intact can often be helped with a cochlear implant. But inserting the implant into the inner ear is not without risks, as facial nerves can be damaged in the process. Empa researchers have developed a novel smart drill that minimizes the risk by automatically shutting off when it comes near nerves. Methods of Advanced Manufacturing can lead to remarkable advances in surgery. A group of researchers led by Stefan Weber of the University…

… are a key driver of autoimmune diseases. Rogue immune cells are a major contributor to autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis and aplastic anaemia. Gene variants associated with leukaemia can produce ‘rogue’ immune cells that drive autoimmune diseases, according to a new study from the Garvan Institute of Medical Research. Scientists had previously noticed that leukaemia patients were also likely to develop an autoimmune disease, such as rheumatoid arthritis or aplastic anaemia. Research into this link revealed that immune cells…

The researchers will now adapt the platform to make it portable and connectable to mobile devices for use in diagnosing COVID-19 and other infectious diseases. Rapid, cheap and accurate tests continue to be essential for epidemiological surveillance and for health services to monitor and contain the spread of SARS-CoV-2. Brazilian scientists have contributed to endeavors in this field by developing an electrochemical immunosensor that detects antibodies against the virus. The innovation is described in an article published recently in the journal ACS Biomaterials…

Working memory, also called short-term memory, was long theorised to have the core task of actively storing information over a short period of time. Nowadays, working memory is considered more complex, because processes such as information selection and the planning of future actions run in parallel. In a recent study, a group of researchers at Leibniz Research Centre for Working Environment and Human Factors at TU Dortmund (IfADo) shed light on the prerequisites for the initiation of motor preparation processes…

How can we see what neurons deep in the cortex are doing during behavior? Researchers of the MPINB developed a microscope small enough to be carried on the head of a freely moving mouse and capable of measuring neuronal activity in all, even the deepest, cortical layers. The 2-gram microscope is controlled remotely, minimizing the need to handle the animal. It also incorporates new technology enabling imaging in lit environments, something that comparable microscopes struggled to do. Neuronal activity can…

Laboratory parameters maintained at physiologically relevant levels allow for more robust experiments with human cells. A cell-culturing technique developed by KAUST scientists helps to create biological conditions that more closely mirror physiological environments compared to standard protocols used in most laboratories today. The new bioreactor system delivers gases — rather than chemicals — to keep acidity levels and oxygen exchange kinetics within body-like ranges, an approach that allows for more careful control of environmental parameters. It is also more responsive…

Is it possible to control an animal’s or a cell’s behavior using light? In recent years, remarkable progress in optogenetics has been made as research methods come close to realizing this goal. A research group led by Professors Mitsumasa Koyanagi and Akihisa Terakita of the Graduate School of Science, and Professor Eriko Kage-Nakadai of the Graduate School of Human Life and Ecology at Osaka Metropolitan University has revealed a new system that allows them to control the behavior of the…

New research helps to resolve evolutionary origins of the “platypus of fungi”. About 600 seemingly disparate fungi that never quite found a fit along the fungal family tree have been shown to have a common ancestor, according to a University of Alberta-led research team that used genome sequencing to give these peculiar creatures their own classification home. “They don’t have any particular feature that you can see with the naked eye where you can say they belong to the same…

Cephalopods like octopuses, squids and cuttlefish are highly intelligent animals with complex nervous systems. In “Science Advances”, a team led by Nikolaus Rajewsky of the Max Delbrück Center has now shown that their evolution is linked to a dramatic expansion of their microRNA repertoire. If we go far enough back in evolutionary history, we encounter the last known common ancestor of humans and cephalopods: a primitive wormlike animal with minimal intelligence and simple eyespots. Later, the animal kingdom can be…

Collaborative Research Centre on magnetoreception and animal navigation at the University of Oldenburg has been awarded funding for another four years. The astonishing navigational skills of birds, bats and fish and their ability to use the Earth’s magnetic field for orientation have been the focus of the Collaborative Research Centre “Magnetoreception and Vertebrate Navigation” at the University of Oldenburg for the last four years. The German Research Foundation (DFG) has now extended its funding for the project, and the Collaborative…

Protein scissors activate defense function. For several years now, the CRISPR/Cas9 gene scissors have been causing a sensation in science and medicine. This new tool of molecular biology has its origins in an ancient bacterial immune system. It protects bacteria from attack by so-called phages, i. e. viruses that infect bacteria. Researchers from the Institute of Structural Biology at the University Hospital Bonn (UKB) and the Medical Faculty of the University of Bonn, in cooperation with the partner University of…

With the help of an AI, researchers at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, have succeeded in designing synthetic DNA that controls the cells’ protein production.  The technology can contribute to the development and production of vaccines, drugs for severe diseases, as well as alternative food proteins much faster and at significantly lower costs than today. How our genes are expressed is a process that is fundamental to the functionality of cells in all living organisms. Simply put, the genetic code…

Fertilization of an egg by sperm is the beginning of new life. The maternal and paternal genetic information, that collectively store the body plan of the living being, are combined after fertilization. However, the DNA is still in an inactive state in the cell nucleus at this early stage of life. While the first division of the fertilized egg cell functions with the help of maternal factors stored in the egg, for further development of an embryo the synthesis of…

Development of new antibody therapies necessary. Are the currently approved antibody therapies used to treat individuals at increased risk for severe COVID-19 disease also effective against currently circulating viral variants? A recent study by researchers at the German Primate Center (DPZ) – Leibniz Institute for Primate Research and Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg shows that the Omicron sub-lineage BQ.1.1, currently on the rise worldwide, is resistant to all approved antibody therapies (The Lancet Infectious Diseases). As a result of an infection with…

Pulse radiolysis experiments help reveal how unpaired electrons at one end of a molecule can initiate chemistry at ‘distant’ locations. Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory helped measure how unpaired electrons in atoms at one end of a molecule can drive chemical reactivity on the molecule’s opposite side. As described in a paper recently published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, this work, in collaboration with  Princeton University, shows how molecules containing these so-called free radicals…