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Tag: "mutant" at biology news

Salk and Stanford teams join forces to reveal two paths of neurodegeneration

...ver, in so called Wlds mice, a naturally occurring mutant strain discovered years ago, the process is slowed, because the mice make a mutant protein--known as Wlds --that inhibits degeneration. But the mutant Wlds protein doesn't hamper th...

Scientists reverse evolution

...ated gene could be inserted into a disease-causing mutant gene to restore its normal function and cure the d...anemia named beta-thalassemia, which occurs when a mutant beta hemoglobin gene results in faulty production of hemoglobin. The new study suggests it might be ...

Loosen up, DNA: Leukemia gene changes genetic packaging

...white. By looking at the eye color of a variety of mutant flies, the team at the University of Rochester Med...ounts of the signaling system and compared them to mutant flies with increased or decreased JAK/STAT signaling. They moved the location of the "red-eye report...

Lack of key enzyme associated with development of rare tumor

...mors. The researchers found four patients who had mutant copies of a gene that contains the information for Phosphodiesterase 11A (PDE11A). Phosphodiesterases are a family of enzymes involved in "switching off" a cell's response to hormones, Dr. Stratakis explained. For a hormone to affect the cell, it m...

Salk scientists get to the root of plant cell fate

...n being topped by a lovely, fragrant bloom, a rose mutant in the gene known as TOPLESS would be crowned by a...or shoot half of a plant embryo. "In plants with a mutant TOPLESS, genes that should be kept off in order to produce a shoot aren't, so a root is produced," h...

Gene linked to rare disease activates fat breakdown

...wn as Chanarin-Dorfman Syndrome (CDS), who carry a mutant version of the gene, suffer from the widespread buildup of fat in tissues throughout their bodies. The group found that the gene "CGI-58" is a strong activator of one of three lipid-degrading enzymes, or lipases, that disassemble triacylglycerol. Tr...

Diabetes research takes wing thanks to long-lived fruit fly

...pected new path in the fight against diabetes. The mutant fly is serving as a portal for understanding the factors that determine how nutrition and stress set the foundation for metabolic syndrome and diabetes, why diabetes occurs more frequently as people age, and indeed why people live as long as they do....

Fly's courtship sheds light on the formation of innate behaviors

... are exclusively expressed in male flies. Using a mutant that specifically disrupts one form of the Fruitless protein, the researchers showed that the male fly's sexual behavior is not a closed neural circuit, but rather a series of independent but interlinked steps that are regulated to have an additive e...

Serotonin, acting in a specific brain region, promotes sleep in fruit flies

...of sleep. Serotonin even improves sleep in certain mutant flies that normally sleep less or have fragmented sleep, suggesting that serotonin treatment can overcome some deficits caused by other sleep problems. The researchers also identified a serotonin receptor that affects sleep, and showed that it acts i...

'Cellular antennae' on algae give clues to how human cells receive signals

..., or IFT. The UT Southwestern researchers used a mutant temperature-sensitive strain of the alga that behaved normally at lower temperatures. At higher temperatures, however, the IFT process stopped, and its components disappeared from the cilia. The cilia themselves were still able to beat, or move back ...

Why mice don't get cancer of the retina

...e stages of development. The authors show that, in mutant mouse embryos that do not express Rb at all, the l... development. The reverse situation is observed in mutant embryos that do not express p107. This suggests that Rb and p107 compensate for each other in retina...

Mutant mice show key autism traits

...r brain function such as learning and memory. The mutant mice showed major abnormalities in a variety of so...est when such new mice are later reintroduced, the mutant mice did not show such a reduction in interest. This abnormality indicated "impaired social learning...

Tamed 11,400 years ago, figs were likely first domesticated crop

...esticated variants and determined that they were a mutant selectively propagated by humans. In this variety of fig, known as parthenocarpic, the fruit develops without insect pollination and is prevented from falling off the tree, allowing it to become soft, sweet, and edible. However, because such figs do ...

Gene transfer using mutant form of good cholesterol cuts vascular plaque and inflammation

Transfer of a gene that produces a mutant form of good cholesterol provides significantly be...n the blood stream. Apolipoprotein A-I Milano is a mutant form, which was originally found in a small number of individuals in Italy who appear to be protecte...

Test reveals effectiveness of potential Huntington's disease drugs

...ains of mice genetically engineered to express the mutant human Huntington gene. As predicted, glutamate killed the Huntington's neurons, but the scientists also tested five clinically relevant glutamate inhibitors to assess their protective ability. Folic acid has been suggested as a treatment for peopl...

Eat less, weigh more? Enzyme makes lean mice 'susceptible' to dietary fat

... with standard laboratory mouse chow, the knockout mutant mice ate about 25 percent less food than their normal siblings. Therefore, the researchers concluded, CPT1c must play a role in feeding behavior and appetite control. And when fed a high-fat diet (mouse chow laced with lard) for 10 weeks, mice lac...

Inheriting a tendency to brain infection

...search Institute in La Jolla, California created a mutant mouse that did not respond to certain molecules that normally trigger cells to produce type I interferon. The mouse turned out to be vulnerable to a range of infections, but its susceptibility to herpes simplex had not been tested. "Nevertheless," sa...

Scientists solve 30-year-old mystery of mutant mouse's kidney woes

...dy to identify where aqp2 is in the kidneys of the mutant mice, they saw that distribution of the protein wa...waste stream for recirculation in the body. In the mutant mice, though, aqp2 was scattered around the collection duct cells. "The protein is still there, bu...

Solved: The mystery of flesh-eating bacteria's relentless attack

... an enzyme called ScpC. The team then created a mutant variation of the M14 strain of Streptococcus that ... original M14. Only three of 28 mice receiving the mutant strain succumbed to infection, a death rate much lower than that of mice who received the original s...

P(acman) takes a bite out of deciphering Drosophila DNA

...esearcher to pinpoint where he or she wants to the mutant gene to go in the genetic blueprint of the fly, eliminating the apples-and-oranges problem. This third technique ?phiC31 ?works also in mouse and human cells, implying that this new technique could be used in those cells as well. ...

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