Cancer researchers add spice to research against rare neuromuscular disease
...id glutamine. In such diseases, the extra amino acids become part of abnormal proteins that clump up inside neurons, creating a clog that can bring normal molecular activity to a standstill. The clumps of material eventually become toxic to neurons. In Kennedy's disease, a vital molecule known as CRE...Small molecule dervived from Rb2/p130 could act as cancer therapeutic
... Rb2/p130's spacer domain--a sequence of 212 amino acids located in the pocket or middle section of the gen...out trying to reduce the spacer domain's 212 amino acids down to the smallest sequence that would still produce the same functionality as p21, explained Gior...Buckyballs used as 'passkey' into cancer cells
...sed on pheylalanine, one of the 20 essential amino acids that are strung together like beads on a necklace to build all proteins. Barron's graduate student, Jianzhong Yang, developed several different Baa-containing peptides, or slivers of protein containing about a dozen or so amino acids. In their nat...Scripps Research study reveals new activation mechanism for pain sensing channel
...tly and irreversibly binding to the cysteine amino acids of this protein," said Ardem Patapoutian, a Scripps Research scientist whose laboratory conducted the study. "Our study shows that TRPA1 activation is directly linked to chemical insult." "Cysteines, one of the twenty building blocks of all prote...Baby fish 'smell their way home'
...ignature, a rich mixture of the proteins and amino acids emitted by corals, all the plankton and mucus from its life. We think baby fish can pick this up and distinguish it from other reefs. "We think some fishes then choose currents that smell like 'home' and swim up them. The ones that cannot do thi......k protein products to be broken down to free amino acids and thus drive hydration of the maturing eggs. The timing of these events matches the appearance of the vast numbers of marine acanthomorph teleosts in the fossil record. The authors propose that the neo-functionalization of duplicated vitellogenin g...Magic Beans -- Anti-obesity soya could help prevent diabetes
...nd adipose tissue, reducing synthesis of new fatty acids and cholesterol. It is this metabolic effect that may explain the traditional Asian use of black soya in the treatment of diabetes. ‘The key problem in type II diabetes is impairment of insulin action, mainly as a result of excess abdominal adipose t......meter. This ring functions to keep the bone-eating acids and enzymes produced between the cell and the bone confined to the demolition site. How does this ring form? To solve the mystery, Prof. Benjamin Geiger, Dean of Biology, and Prof. Lia Addadi of the Structural Biology Department, together with do...Coated nanoparticles solve sticky drug-delivery problem
...the delivery of chemotherapy, antibiotics, nucleic acids and other treatment directly to the lungs, gastrointestinal tract and cervicovaginal tract. ...Why don't all moles progress to melanoma?
...n factory. The process begins when chains of amino acids are deposited in the ER membrane in response to co...ns from genes. Chaperone proteins fold these amino acids into specific shapes. When too many of them build up in the membrane, or when something goes wrong w...Uncovering DNA's 'sweet' secret
...m For example, it cannot pair with other nucleic acids - unlike DNA and RNA which can and must pair with each other. Also the steep angle, or inclination, between the sugar backbone and the bases of homo-DNA requires that the pairing strands align strictly in an antiparallel fashion - unlike DNA which ca...Common ancestry of bacterium and plants could be key to an effective new treatment for chlamydia
... of how plants produce lysine, one of the 20 amino acids normally found in proteins. Scientists have known the specific pathways of lysine production in bacteria for more than a half-century. They also have known some of the steps by which lysine is produced in plants, but they didn't really have the full ...Fantastic Voyage: A new nanoscale view of the biological world
...onal images of proteins, DNA, RNA, sugar and fatty acids at a subcellular level in tissue sections or cells. "Using MIMS, we can image and quantify the fate of these molecules when they go into cells, where they go, and how quickly they are replaced," says Lechene. The method does not need staining or u...Clue found to Epstein-Barr virus' ability to form and sustain tumors
...iments to mutate various segments of the 640 amino acids that make up the EBNA-1 protein, which is one of a...o protein. Mutating the unique segment of amino acids prevented EBNA-1 from transforming resting B cells into proliferating cells. Under normal condition...Selecting life: Scientists find new way to search for origin of life
...e essential ingredients to all life--such as amino acids (the building blocks of proteins) and nucleic acids (the essence of DNA). But which of the countless possible combinations of biomolecules and mineral ...Detailed 3-D image catches a key regulator of neural stem cell differentiation in action
... first author. "It turns out that only three amino acids are important for Scp1's ability to know how to remove phosphates from RNA polymerase." She adds that knowing how enzymes like Scp1 precisely recognize that seven amino acid stretch is exactly the kind of "unambiguous information relevant for th...Scientists design simple dipstick test for cocaine, other drugs
...." Lu said. Aptamers are single-stranded nucleic acids that can bind to specific molecules in three-dimensions. For each molecular target, such as cocaine, a corresponding aptamer can be selected from a large DNA library. By using lateral flow devices as platforms to separate aptamer-linked nanoparticl...Mayo discovers protein as potential tactic to prevent tumors
...to a specific serine residue on the chain of amino acids that make up FOXO1. In case of robust errors found in the genetic code, CDK2 signals FOXO1 to explicitly call for the cell to produce a set of proteins leading to apoptosis. "If the cell has minor alterations in the DNA code that can be repaired, ...Motorola researchers develop selective sensors based on carbon nanotubes
... so amino acids, so changing the sequence of amino acids allows the researchers to "tune the peptides and recognize different compounds," Tao said. "We developed a simple way to attach different peptides to different nanotubes." Erica Forzani, an ASU assistant research professor in electrical engineerin...Biologists probe the machinery of cellular protein factories
...no acid building blocks, and the sequence of amino acids determines the protein's structure. Amino acids are carried to the ribosome by transfer RNA molecules. On the ribosome, the transfer RNAs recognize ...