Life Sciences and Chemistry

Microscopic glass beads wearing coats identical to the outer membrane of a cell provide a powerful assay for proteins that bind to cell membranes, such as protein drugs or drug candidates, according to chemists at the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL).

The membrane-coated beads, complete with receptors that dot the surfaces of real cells, also would make a sensitive detection system for viruses or protein toxins like those produced by choler

Acinetobacter baumannii is an opportunistic pathogen operating in hospitals creating serious infections such as pneumonia. It principally affects patients who have weakened health and this is why we call it opportunistic. Moreover, the mortality rate from these infections are usually high given, on the one hand, the weakness of the patient and, on the other, A. baumannii is resistant to many antibiotics. Furthermore, once a specific course of treatment is prescribed for A. Baumannii, the pathogen has

Because of their therapeutic potential, stem cells are today a major focus of at-tention in biomedical research. To realise this potential, however, it is essential to know the signal factors that can regulate the differentiation of a stem cell into the various cell types of an organism. An important factor in stem cell biology is the signal protein “Wnt”. In the case of quite a number of stem cell types, such as embryonal stem cells or stem cells of the central nervous system, “Wnt” re-sults in cell

Mayo Clinic genomics researchers are the first to demonstrate that mixing of genetic material can occur naturally, in a living body. The researchers have discovered conditions in which pig cells and human cells can fuse together in the body to yield hybrid cells that contain genetic material from both species and carry a swine virus similar to HIV (the virus that causes AIDS) that can infect normal human cells.

While the research does not answer the question of whether this infection can ca

Researchers at the University of Florida say they have shown that minerals were key to some of the initial processes that formed life on Earth.

Specifically, a borax-containing mineral known as colemanite helps convert organic molecules found in interstellar dust clouds into a sugar, known as ribose, central to the genetic material called RNA. This announcement provides a key step toward solving the 3-billion-year-old mystery of how life on Earth began. The findings will appear in Friday’s

Researchers have identified a crucial step in a genetic process required for the development of viable eggs. The process, known as imprinting, distinguishes the paternally-inherited and the maternally-inherited copies of a number of developmentally important genes.

The majority of mammalian genes are present in two copies, both of which are equally expressed and regulated. A small number of mammalian genes, however, are subject to special regulation by a process called gene imprinting. The i