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Tag: "explains" at biology news

When it comes to cell entry, being average has its advantages

...itute for Metals Research has created a model that explains how viruses and other bioparticles slip inside cells without a special protein coating called clathrin. The secret, it seems, is to be average. Mid-sized nanomaterials ?about 27 to 30 nanometers in diameter, or about 1,000 times thinner than a human...

Achilles heel of the herpes virus possibly found

...ellular fusion protein for entry into cells." She explains that the search for the mechanisms by which HSV enters cells has been hindered by the fact that the virus is very good at entering so many kinds of cells. The many possibilities for virus binding to cells make deciphering the entry process a difficul...

Blink, and the brain misses it

...he pupil during a blink and the world going dark," explains Professor Frith. In summing up the study's implications, the authors suggest that when we blink, the brain may just miss it. Bristow et al.: "Blinking suppresses the neural response to unchanging retinal stimulation." Publishing in Current Biology, ...

Biologists determine genetic blueprint of social amoeba

... are presently found in either plants or animals," explains William Loomis, a professor of biology at UCSD and one of the key members of the international sequencing effort. "Specialization appears to lead to loss of genes as well as the modification of copies of old genes. As each new genome is sequenced, we...

Cats' indifference towards sugar explained

...ndifferent to sweets. A new study in PLoS Genetics explains the molecular mechanism behind their strictly carn...t is this lack of a functional sweet receptor that explains cats' indifference to sweet stimuli. Cats have no way to recognize carbohydrates, and therefore eat...

Exercise training in ordinary people affects the activity of 500 genes

...sily to training than others. It is not known what explains this. The results from the training study show that those individuals that improved their performance most also activated several genes in the muscles markedly more. This has not been shown before. Finally, the researchers made a comparison between ...

Study shows how retinoic acid enters a cell's nucleus

...ue of the journal Molecular Cell (Vol. 18, No. 3), explains for the first time how the cancer-fighting vitamin... in the literature for a long time," Noy says. "It explains a basic mechanism of how this protein, CRABP-II, gets into the nucleus, where it can act to suppress...

Orientation and the egg

...ires predetermination for successful development," explains Dr. Hiiragi. ...

'Punctuated' evolution in the human genome

...Other regions may show different temporal biases," explains Eichler. "The important implication here is that episodic bursts of activity challenge the concept of gradual clock-like changes during the course of genome evolution. Since duplications are important in the birth of new genes and large-scale chromos...

Female volunteers prepare for a second 'bedrest'

...f the psychological factors we will be studying ," explains Peter Jost. " Future long-term missions will be manned by mixed, international teams and we know that the psychological balance has a important influence on the physiological balance." Women volunteers must be between 25 and 40 years of age, healthy...

Looks matter to female barn swallows

...ales are assessing mates on a day-to-day basis, it explains why males continue to maintain costly ornaments even when they might appear to have served their purpose," said co-author Irby Lovette, assistant professor and director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Evolutionary Biology program. "Our goal is n...

'Jumping genes' contribute to the uniqueness of individual brains

...1 elements are active in testis and ovaries, which explains how they potentially play a role in evolution by p...open up genes and expose their DNA to insertions," explains co- author Alysson R. Muotri. "What we have shown for the first time is that a single insertion can ...

Engineered molecule amplifies body's immune response

...low, the host is highly susceptible to infection," explains Dr. Michael J. Holtzman of the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri. "This also applies to Stat1. Children who are born with genetic deficiencies of Stat1 are also very susceptible to infection. In the more severe case, the...

Bitter or sweet? The same taste bud can tell the difference

...e taste bud cells, a new study reports. The study explains the discovery of a chemical messenger called neuropeptide Y (NPY) in taste bud cells. Though researchers have long known that NPY is active in the brain and gut, this is the first study to show that it is also active in taste bud cells. That finding...

Chemical 'band-aid' prevents heart failure in mice with muscular dystrophy

...ents. "Most people think of the heart as a pump," explains Metzger, a professor of molecular and integrative physiology and of internal medicine in the U-M Medical School. "They say their heart is failing, because it's not pumping hard enough. That can be true, but another major problem is poor function duri...

Structures of marine toxins provide insight into their effectiveness as cancer drugs

...ial for cellular locomotion, division and growth," explains Allingham. "Because cancer cell masses grow faster than other cells in the body, actin provides an excellent target for drugs that could inhibit such rapid growth." Adds Allingham: "These marine toxins can knock out the lynchpins in these long chai...

Energy management in cells may hold key to cancer defense

... cell's energy level is critical to its survival," explains Witters, who likens a low-energy cell to a car with no gas in its tank. "In a previous study, we found that the cellular "gas gauge," AMPK, can turn around and alter any deficits in the cell if it is turned on by the kinase LKB1. In this JBC study,...

Discovery of T-cell 'traffic control' boosts new drug promise

...T cells can swamp healthy tissue. The new research explains how a promising experimental drug treats the autoimmune disease multiple sclerosis by blocking excess S1P action. The research also shows the promise of similar strategies to prevent rejection of transplanted organs and tissues without compromising e...

Envisat and ERS-2 reveal hidden side of Hurricane Rita

...m dedicated flights by hurricane hunter aircraft," explains Hans Graber of CSTARS. "However these flight missions cannot always take place. Satellite remote sensing provides a critical alternative approach. "It is critical for weather forecasters to obtain reliable characterization of the eye wall dimension...

Primate virus jumps species barrier to humans for first time in Asia

...ca, largely because that is where HIV originated," explains Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel, lead author of the study and a research scientist in the Division of International Programs at the Washington National Primate Research Center. "But there has not been much work on the topic in Asia, which has huge primate diver...

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