Tag: "excitation" at biology news

50-year-old Mystery Solved: Protein Tags Regulate Key Ion Channel

...bed in the 1950s when it was recognized to control excitation of nerves, the reason for leak had not previously been understood. The first human clone of this channel, K2P1, generated a good deal of excitement, Goldstein said, but no one could learn much about it because it always seemed to be mute. "This disc...

Plants reveal a secret and bring researchers nearer a cleaner future

...fluorescence from the sample that is emitted after excitation with X-rays. They flashed the sample with a laser and registered the change using X-ray fluorescence every 10 microseconds to find out how different oxidation states developed. When carefully analysing the reaction kinetics, they observed a time de...

Team led by Carnegie Mellon University scientist finds first evidence of a living memory trace

... a matrix of the extent (or amplitude) of neuronal excitation and inhibition within glomeruli. He retrieved a spatial pattern of synchronized, correlated activity ?the memory trace ?from what appeared to be random fluctuations of neural activity. "The trace is like a fingerprint that disappears over time. It's...

Molecular mechanism may explain how fevers spark seizures

...the cell membrane could leave a neuron open to the excitation and repetitive firing that characterizes seizures. The investigators are currently studying where the receptors go when the temperature is raised -- are they taken inside the cell more quickly, are they degraded, is their forward insertion into the c...

Experimental drug reverses key cognitive deficits, pathology in Alzheimer's

... such cellular responses as the wave of electrical excitation of a nerve impulse. As an animal model of AD, the researchers used a "triple knockout" mouse in which three key genes involved in normal brain protein processing pathways had been knocked out, creating both amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangl...

Striking the right balance between excitation and inhibition

...le of Notch as an arbitrator of the choice between excitation and inhibition, Goulding says: "The degree of Notch expression on one neuron tells the sibling cell that it cannot be the same thing. If it is up-regulated in one cell, Notch will be down-regulated in its sibling. "There are thousands of different ki...

Researchers add to understanding of how brain cells communicate

...d NR1/2D. Although NR1/2A receptors require strong excitation to let calcium ions flow across the membrane, NR1/2D receptors respond even to weak inputs. In this paper, Johnson and Qian further elucidate how NR1/2D receptors do this. Johnson was most surprised to find that the magnesium ion, which strongly b...

Hopkins researchers discover how brain protein might control memory

...er-excite a cell to death, says Worley, and if the excitation controls come off, the strength of long-term memory is altered. So what does Arc's control over brain cell receptors mean for our ability to remember where we put the car keys? "We know that animals lacking Arc live only in the here and now. They ...

Drug treatment improves learning in mice with Down syndrome symptoms, Stanford/Packard study shows

...l brains maintain a precise ratio between neuronal excitation and inhibition that allows efficient learning. In ...mation. "In general, learning involves neuronal excitation in certain parts of the brain," said Garner. "For example, caffeine, which is a stimulant, can make ...

Protein enables discovery of quantum effect in photosynthesis

...osynthetic energy transfer process as one in which excitation energy hops from light-capturing pigment molecules to reaction center molecules step-by-step down the molecular energy ladder. "The classical hopping description of the energy transfer process is both inadequate and inaccurate," said Fleming. "It ...

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