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Tag: "path" at biology news

Evolution follows few of the possible paths to antibiotic resistance

...ve it, because in the present case each mutational path is composed exclusively of mutations known jointly to improve resistance." Weinreich argues that this finding likely applies to most protein evolution, not just the beta-lactamase enzyme.Although many mutational paths lead to favored variants, only ...

Losing sleep undoes the rejuvenating effects new learning has on the brain

...ep-restricted rats had a harder time remembering a path through a maze compared to their rested counterparts. And unlike the rats that got enough sleep, the sleep-restricted rats showed reduced survival rate of new hippocampus cells. The researchers used sleep-restricted rats rather than sleep-deprived r...

First demonstration of 'teaching' in non-human animals

...uently to consolidate its growing knowledge of the path that it has taken. Tandem leaders pay a cost because they would normally have reached thefood around four times faster if not hampered by a follower. But the benefit is that the follower learns where the food is much quicker than it would have done...

Rare Chinese frogs communicate by means of ultrasonic sound

...detection of ultrasound. Recessed ears shorten the path between eardrums and the ear, enabling the transmission of ultrasound to the ears." To test if the frogs actually communicated with their ultrasonic sounds, Feng and colleagues returned to China with their recording equipment and a special device th...

Salmonella caught red-handed

...covered hundreds of different Salmonella metabolic path proteins. The scientists compared them with special protein databanks and identified possible points of attack for antibiotics. Bumann and his team then examined what role these proteins play in a Salmonella infection. The scientists turned off gene...

Rutgers researchers find fat gene

...e PAP enzyme, allowing them to backtrack along the path to its origin ?the gene that coded it ?linking the enzyme to the yeast gene PAH1 that made it. Carman and his group went on to confirm the link by introducing the yeast gene into bacteria, with similar results. The researchers showed that the enzyme...

Novel molecular 'signature' marks DNA of embryonic stem cells

... scientists announced today a critical step on the path of realizing the promise of embryonic stem (ES) cells for medicine. As described in the April 21 issue of Cell, the researchers have discovered unique molecular imprints coupled to DNA in mouse ES cells that help explain the cells' rare ability to fo...

Researchers release new variety of asparagus

...orporating new approaches in their research. "One path we may take is to identify 'supermale' plants that produce only male offspring when hybridized with a female. Such male varieties are used in Europe and other parts of the US, but have not been successful in California," Roose said. "Male plants pro...

Malaria parasites develop in lymph nodes

...tes moved through the skin in a random, circuitous path at a speed that is amongst the fastest recorded for any migrating cell. After leaving the skin, the parasites frequently invaded blood vessels. That was no surprise to Ménard, since they need to travel through blood vessels to get to the liver. Howe...

Enzyme inhibitors block replication of SARS virus

...SARS virus protease inhibitors known today." The path to today's research finding has taken several years. In 2002, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) emerged in rural China and eventually spread to 32 countries, according to the World Health Organization. SARS is caused by a ring-shaped virus, kn...

Pain killer fights breast cancer by targeting key enzyme

...drug discovery with nimesulide analogs, and a long path of preclinical research is needed before we can even begin to think about potential drugs." The researchers took several of these nimesulide analogs and, in laboratory cultures, tested their effects on estrogen-dependent breast cancer cells taken fr...

Intelligently designed molecular evolution

...ested in promiscuous enzymes until an evolutionary path that achieves a desired result is found. The amino acid substitutions that significantly drive molecular evolution are called "plasticity residues." The Berkeley researchers identified the plasticity residues for the Grand fir sesquiterpene syntha...

Performing monkeys in Asia carry viruses that could jump species to humans

...ny Asian countries, could represent a little-known path for viruses to jump the species barrier from monkeys to humans and eventually cause human disease. Performing monkeys are animals that are trained to produce tricks in public. While scientists have conducted extensive research on primate-to-human v...

Should doctors tell patients about expensive, unfunded drugs?

... what a patient would want is "a dangerous medical path to unjustified paternalism." A further ethical issue concerns the cost of publicly funding newer, expensive treatments, they write. This is an urgent question of distributing limited resources fairly that faces not just new drugs, but many forms of...

Scientists show how thinking can harm brain cells

... Understanding this mechanism could provide a new path for drugs to treat the diseases. Working in collaboration with researchers at the University of California at San Diego, the Rochester scientists propose a strategy of chemical preconditioning to induce adaptations in nerve cells that would enable th...

Research: Snails were overlooked contributors to marsh destruction

...rom reaching the grass. They put enclosures in the path of expanding die offs, as well as in remnants of healthy marsh. After 14 months, the patches were "robust and green" compared with denuded areas where snails moved through. ...

Bats use touch receptors on wings to fly, catch prey, study finds

...ensitive receptors help them maintain their flight path and snag their prey. Touch receptors take the form of tiny bumps, or raised domes, along the surface of bats' wings. The domes contain Merkel cells, a type of "touch" cell common in bumps on the skin of most mammals, including humans. Bat touch dome...

Switching to new anti-bacterial targets: Riboswitches

...crystal structures of purine riboswitches, opens a path to the directed design of drugs targeting riboswitches for use as antibiotics. According to the researchers, it is inevitable that bacteria will evolve and that the drugs we use to cure bacterial infections will eventually become ineffective. While ...

How Fruitflies Know It's Time for Lunch

...s studying the fruitfly Drosophila have traced the path of olfactory signals beginning with chemical receptors in the mouth, which set off neurons that signal the antennal lobe of the central nervous system. From here, the electrical stimulation zooms toward the so-called mushroom body, a mushroom-shaped ...

Scientists pinpoint inflammation gene

...loping heart disease and diabetes," he said. The path to discovery: finding SEPS1 and its influence These groundbreaking findings about SEPS1 are built upon a discovery five years ago by ChemGenex Pharmaceuticals. The company was studying the desert sand rat, an animal that, like humans, has certain ...

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