Protein plays role in inherited cancer syndrome, may be key to other tumors

A research team based at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) has identified a key cellular function of a protein known to be involved in the rare genetic disorder neurofibromatosis type 2 (NF2). The protein, called merlin, plays a key role in cell-to-cell communication and may be involved in other types of cancer. The discovery also may support the theory that some tumors are destined to spread or metastasize

One key to platelet integrin receptor found in transmembrane region

Integrin receptors allow cells to attach to other cells and to connective tissue which is necessary to form tissues, organs, or even people, for that matter. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have demonstrated that a key to activating αIIbβ3, the integrin that allows platelets to form blood clots, can be found in the part of the molecule embedded within a platelet’s outer

Under the right economic conditions, a growing demand for forest products that accompanies development may lead to an increase – not a decline – in forest cover, according to a new study by researchers at Brown University and Harvard University. Policies that focus on reducing paper demand may not necessarily increase forestation.

The study examined the connection between the economy and forest cover in India, a country with a relatively closed economy that experienced an apparent increase

Computer security researchers suggest ways to thwart new form of cybercrime

Most experts on computer crime focus on attacks against Web servers, bank account tampering and other mischief confined to the digital world. But by using little more than a Web search engine and some simple software, a computer-savvy criminal or terrorist could easily leap beyond the boundaries of cyberspace to wreak havoc in the physical world, a team of Internet security researchers has concluded.

Results from Model-based functional genomics research provides new insight on the pathogenetic mechanism which causes diseases such as ALS

Ingenium Pharmaceuticals AG and a coalition of international research organizations announced today the publication in Science of research describing a fundamental discovery about the genetic and molecular basis for Motor Neuron Disease (MND), which includes Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). The research explains a key pathogenetic mechanism of

In the fall of 1952, Stanley Miller, now a chemistry professor emeritus at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), began simulating primitive earthly conditions in an experiment that produced the basic building blocks of life. When he published the results in Science on May 15 the following year, he kick-started research on the origin of life and transformed modern thinking on a dormant area of science.

Jeffrey Bada, a professor of marine chemistry at Scripps Institution of Oceanogr