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Tag: "probe" at biology news

Stretching DNA to the limit

...ndividual DNA molecules with the tip of a scanning probe microscope and stretch it while measuring the forces generated. These "stretch—release" measurements enable the accurate determination of changes in the elasticity of the DNA strands. Upon exposure to UV light, the force profile of the viral DNA chan...

Light-based probe 'sees' early cancers in first tests on human tissue

...st laboratory tests on human tissue, a light-based probe built by researchers at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering almost instantly detected the earliest signs of cancer in cells that line internal organs. If the preliminary success of the "optical biopsy" is confirmed through clinical trials,...

Widely used hepatitis B drug spurs HIV drug resistance

...tests what drugs affect HIV and can be tailored to probe effects on any particular mutant of HIV. Lab results showed that entecavir, in concentrations less than a tenth of what is used in humans, cut the number of newly infected cells in half. However, at increasing concentrations, the drug had no gr...

One-of-a-kind imaging probe reveals secrets useful for drug discovery

...oscopy equipped an NMR spectrometer with a special probe to examine the venom, which the walking stick spra...airly standard, but the extreme sensitivity of the probe - the component that is inserted into the magnet to obtain chemical information from the samples. D...

Tearing down the fungal cell wall

...formatic and gene prediction tools were applied to probe the structure and organization of the AbNPS2 gene and the surrounding region in the recently sequenced A. brassicicola genome, a collaborative project nearing completion with Washington University Genome Sequencing Center in St. Louis. Electron micro...

Slow brain waves play key role in coordinating complex activity

...nto phase." Knight and his colleagues continue to probe the connection between waves of different frequency in the brain and are building a more closely spaced grid of electrodes that can measure finer detail on the brain's surface. They also plan to combine brain grid recordings with recordings from indi...

Scientists get best look ever at water-life connection

...the interaction was to precisely locate an optical probe on the protein surface. They inserted a molecule of the amino acid tryptophan into the protein as a probe, and measured how water moved around it -- a technique Zhong began to develop when he was a postdoctoral researcher in Nobel laureate Ahmed Zewa...

Three-dimensional, miniature endoscope opens new diagnostic possibilities

... from a single optical fiber ?introduced through a probe about the size of a human hair ?is broken into its... tumors on the abdominal wall of a mouse. The SEE probe was passed into the abdominal cavity through a fine-gauge needle. The resulting three-dimensional i...

New technology used to construct the first map of structural variation in the human genome

...icity of the algorithm, coupled with the increased probe density of these arrays, permitted the identification of approximately 1,000 CNVs, many of which were below the detection size limit of alternative methodologies. Furthermore, the algorithm more accurately estimated CNV boundaries, thereby permittin...

Study offers innovative profile of enzyme that aids tumor growth

...o the availability of an activity-based proteomics probe for this enzyme. Such probes are now available for many enzyme classes that participate in cell metabolism, so Cravatt suggests "a large swath of the enzyme proteome" could be addressed using the study's experimental strategy. "The success of ou...

New biochip helps study living cells, may speed drug development

...y, called "patch clamping," uses a tiny electrical probe viewed under a microscope. The technology garnered its inventors the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology in 1991. "It requires a lot of know-how and hand-eye coordination," Porterfield said of patch clamping. The chip, on the other hand, is...

Researchers find that bumblebees' flower choice matters

...ant species the bees forage on, which flowers they probe and in what order, and how many blooms they visit before moving on to another plant. In doing so, the bees make plant reproduction possible by dispersing pollen. But why go to such lengths to map the flight of the bumblebee? It may seem random and ...

With record resolution and sensitivity, tool images how life organizes in a cell membrane

...common in labs everywhere. It allows scientists to probe the composition of cell membranes with a higher resolution than light microscopy. By providing information about chemical composition of a sample, it fills a gap left by atomic force microscopy, which provides high-resolution information about topogr...

3-D ultrasound scanner could guide robotic surgeries

...urgeon, the researchers said. The 3-D ultrasound probe has yet to be tested in human patients, Smith said, but he added that his team believes the technology is ready for clinical trials. The Duke team in 1987 developed the first-ever 3-D ultrasound scanner for imaging the heart in real time from outsi...

Combination therapy shows promising results in patients with advanced lung cancer

...he efficacy of the combination therapy and further probe the mechanisms of Tarceva resistance, Reckamp said. That study is expected to begin at UCLA in the fall. Reckamp's study was the first to determine the safest and most effective dose of Celebrex to use in lung cancer. Previously, doses were based on...

Gut microbes' partnership helps body extract energy from food, store it as fat

...muel, a doctoral student in Gordon's lab, began to probe the influence of Methanobrevibacter smithii, an archaeon. Originally identified in the 1970s and mistaken for a primitive form of bacteria, archaea initially became famous because of their ability to live in extreme environments where nothing else co...

NYU researchers decorate virus particles, showing potential to enhance MRI capabilities

... "If a radiologist wants to design a versatile probe that can be used in a variety of different imaging protocols, a chemically modified virus particle now appears to be an attractive option for this type of sophisticated application," he noted. "For example, if we can decorate the particles so that th...

Arctic expedition will investigate alien-like glacier

...n other planets within our solar system. Sending a probe to the planet is high on NASA's list of possible projects. Graduate student Damhnait Gleeson from the University Colorado, on a project sponsored by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, will be taking part in the study to determine if it will be worthwh...

Researchers identify human DNA on the fast track

... brain samples," said Salama. "So I gave him a DNA probe from the HAR1 region and said, 'Try this.'" A few months later Vanderhaegen e-mailed Salama with exciting news. He had discovered that RNA including the HAR1 region is first produced between the 7th and 9th weeks of gestation in human embryos. Furt...

Connect the Quantum Dots

...sulo were able to identify operating principles to probe molecular recognition events with luminescence measurements. These findings demonstrate that mechanisms based on photoinduced electron transfer can be exploited to transduce a recognition event into a significant change in the luminescence of a quan...

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