Johns Hopkins researchers have uncovered a key step in the body’s regulation of melatonin, a major sleep-related chemical in the brain. In the advance online section of Nature Structural Biology, the research team reports finding the switch that causes destruction of the enzyme that makes melatonin — no enzyme, no melatonin.

Melatonin levels are high at night and low during the day. Even at night, melatonin disappears after exposure to bright light, a response that likely contributes

An insidious fuzzy gray mold that often coats refrigerated strawberries and many other plants during growing and storage may be prevented by a gene identified by a Purdue University researcher.

The mold is caused by a fungus, Botrytis cinerea, that often enters plant tissue through wounded or dead areas such as wilted petals, bruised fruit or at the site of pruning. In the November issue of the journal The Plant Cell, Purdue plant molecular biologist Tesfaye Mengiste and his colleagues at Sy

Cancer is a complex disease where multiple genetic and environmental factors contribute to risk. Its onset and progression depends on the combination of a series of genetic disruptions rather than on a single event. At a genetic level, it is not just presence or absence of a gene (or a mutated version of the gene) that causes disease, but as Pier Paolo Pandolfi and colleagues report, protein “dose”–that is, the level of remaining activity–also influences cancer progression.

Focusing on th

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have developed an easier and less expensive way to make sockets for prosthetic limbs.

The study’s principal investigator, Jack R. Engsberg, Ph.D., will receive the Howard R. Thranhardt Lecture Honorarium for this work and present preliminary findings at the National Assembly of the American Orthotic and Prosthetic Association at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Oct. 25, in Reno, Nev.

“What we’re doing is an entirel

How the same enzyme helps protect brain cells from the destruction of Alzheimer’s yet contributes to the blood vessel disease of diabetics is a puzzle Dr. Mario B. Marrero wants to solve.

“I call JAK2 the good, the bad and the ugly because its function depends on the cell type and where it acts,” says the biochemist at the Medical College of Georgia who wants to eliminate – or at least control – the “bad” and “ugly.”

JAK2, or janus kinase 2, is an enzyme found in all cells th

Results of 41,885 Patient Analysis Announced at the American College of Rheumatology Annual Scientific Meeting

The disease modifying anti-rheumatic arthritis drug (DMARD), leflunomide does not have a higher risk of liver side effects than the traditional drug, but other newer DMARDs may, according to investigators at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Center (MUHC). Their findings, presented today at the American College of Rheumatology Annual Scientific Meeting, s

Home testing of saliva to measure personal hormone levels is gaining popularity, with dozens of companies offering do-it-yourself, mail-in test kits. Battelle scientists at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory envision a day when it may be nearly as easy to detect chemical exposure or even nerve gas poisoning — simply by analyzing a victim’s saliva. And the results would be almost immediate.

Using sophisticated mass spectrometry equipment at PNNL, researchers hav

Breast cancer patients have a lower chance of long-term survival if they carry an inherited mutation in the BRCA1 gene, according to research published in Breast Cancer Research this week. However, the poor prognosis associated with the mutated gene is mitigated by chemotherapy.

The breast cancer susceptibility genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, were identified over eight years ago, but the best way of treating women who develop hereditary breast cancer associated with mutations in these genes is still

Cumbre Inc. and University of Wisconsin-Madison research collaborator publish data on a new class of bacterial RNA polymerase inhibitor

Cumbre Inc., a privately held biopharmaceutical company, announced today the publication of a research paper in the October 24, 2003 issue of Science entitled “A new class of bacterial RNA polymerase inhibitor affects nucleotide addition.” The paper describes the identification and characterization of the novel “CBR703” class of inhibitors through com

Researchers have found that a promising new class of antibacterial chemicals inhibits one of the most fundamental processes of life – a cell’s ability to express genetic material. Knowing exactly how these chemicals keep bacterial cells in check can help scientists make more effective antibiotics.

Like many bacterial inhibitors, this new class of compounds – called the CBR703 series – inhibits RNA polymerase, the key enzyme in gene expression. However, the unique mechanism that these compou

An estimated 5,000 previously unknown ocean fish species and hundreds of thousands of other marine life forms are yet to be discovered, according to scientists engaged in a massive global scientific collaboration to identify and catalog life in the oceans.

The new marine fish species, being identified at an average rate of 160 per year (roughly three new species per week since year 2000), are being catalogued and mapped by the Census of Marine Life (CoML), an unprecedented cooperativ

Predisposition to many common diseases – among which cancer, cardiovascular conditions, diabetes, asthma, etc. – is said to be a multifactor phenomenon as it results from numerous genes as well as environmental factors. Identifying such predisposition genes is one of the major challenges in modern genetics and could contribute to establishing new preventive medicine patterns and developing new specific drugs.

However, the identification of predisposition genes appeared to be extremely diffic

Understanding cancer

Mayo Clinic researchers are the first to describe what goes wrong during the growth cycle of certain cells that can lead to inherited forms of breast cancer. Knowing the nature of this biochemical modification is a first step to designing drugs that can correct it to stop cancer.

The Mayo Clinic research finding appears in today’s issue of the journal Science. It is important because it solves an aspect of a mystery that cancer researchers worldwide have

Breast cancer patients have a lower chance of long-term survival if they carry an inherited mutation in the BRCA1 gene, according to research published in Breast Cancer Research this week. However, the poor prognosis associated with the mutated gene is mitigated by chemotherapy.

The breast cancer susceptibility genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, were identified over eight years ago, but the best way of treating women who develop hereditary breast cancer associated with mutations in these genes is still

UK research in this week’s issue of THE LANCET suggests that single-dose laser therapy could dramatically reduce inflammatory facial acne for up to 3 months.

Effective new treatments are required for people with acne; this common skin disease can be associated with social isolation, employment difficulties, and occasionally suicide. At present mild to moderate acne is treated with combinations of topical creams and oral antibiotics-treatment that is often unpopular because they need to be t

Immune system provides new clue to most life-threatening bacterium
The microbe that causes tuberculosis operates the way a human terrorist would. With minimal resources, the TB bacterium skillfully blends in and gains strength before lashing out unexpectedly. This microbe, which claims more human lives each year than any other bacterial pathogen, even uses its host’s defenses, hiding out in an immune cell called a macrophage.

Now, Rockefeller scientist John MacMicking, Ph.D., has discov