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Tag: "substances" at biology news

First biomarker for human sleepiness identified in fruit flies

...va. Easily accessible, saliva contains many of the substances found in blood and urine, making it an increasingl...e processes that we've developed to look for other substances that change in connection with the level of sleep debt." Stephen L. Duntley, M.D., associate prof...

Hormone linked to brain's cravings for food and other energy sources

...relin's action may also alter seeking of drugs and substances that work through the same pathways. "We found that if we selectively block ghrelin in this part of the brain, we can suppress feeding or the need to seek out food and energy," said Horvath. "It also suggests that perhaps it could interfere with t...

U-M researchers use nanoparticles to target brain cancer

...of the blood-brain barrier, which prevents harmful substances from traveling through the bloodstream into the brain. In order for chemotherapy to treat a tumor, it must penetrate this barrier. Researchers tested the nanoparticles in cell cultures and animal models. The studies showed the nanoparticles trave...

Exposure to dioxins influences male reproductive system, study of Vietnam veterans concludes

...r. Gupta said. Dioxins are among the most toxic substances known and are thought to be partially responsible for this increase in male reproductive tract disorders. They are formed as byproducts of processes such as incineration, smelting, paper and pulp manufacturing and pesticide and herbicide production. ...

A natural chemical found in strawberries boosts memory in healthy mice

...etin when she screened a collection of flavonoids, substances with anti-oxidant activities found in many plants, for their neuroprotective abilities in tissue culture models of neurodegenerative disease. Maher found that some of those compounds, including fisetin, induced differentiation or maturation of neu...

Psst! Coffee drinkers: Fruit flies have something to tell you about caffeine

...taste of others. By color-coding sweet and bitter substances eaten by fruit flies and examining the coloring that shows up in their translucent bellies, the Hopkins team hoped to learn whether flies missing a specific "taste-receptor" protein changed their taste preferences. "Normally," Montell explains, "wh...

Dragonfly's metabolic disease provides clues about human obesity

...er containing trace amounts of excretory-secretory substances obtained from live parasites showed effects in two days. Abnormal blood glucose concentrations are a symptom of metabolic syndrome in humans. Marden and Schilder also concluded that insects may be useful models to understand more about metabolic di...

Cigarette smoking impedes tendon-to-bone healing

...e not exposed to carbon monoxide, tar or the other substances that harm people who smoke. So if anything, we may have underestimated the negative effects of cigarette smoking on rotator cuff healing." Galatz says the study also may underestimate the harmful effects of smoking because rats tend to be better h...

Zinc plays important role in brain circuitry

To the multitude of substances that regulate neuronal signaling in the brain and spinal cord add a new key player: zinc. By engineering a mouse with a mutation affecting a neuronal zinc target, researchers have demonstrated a central role for zinc in modulating signaling among the...

A new understanding of how cells defend themselves against bacterial pore-forming toxins

...and also protecting the cell from additional toxic substances lurking outside. "This result is important, because it also explains so much in terms of basic cell physiology," notes Van der Goot. If a cell absorbs too much water, for example, this pathway would be triggered. The lipids formed in the metabolic ...

Microcapsules like it hot and salty

...ilities for using the capsules to transport active substances in the body, as components of self-repairing car p...ansport systems which initially enclose the active substances and then release them at the location where they are to be effective given the presence of certain c...

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

...rugs that can affect cilia, in the hope of finding substances that would also be effective in higher animals, Dr. Snell said. "This is another example of how basic science research can have big results," he said. "Studies on Chlamydomonas will help us understand the unique qualities of cilia that have led to ...

Weizmann Institute scientists discover a molecular security mechanism for keeping mutations in check

... into damage from radiation or exposure to harmful substances on the DNA strand, it can stop in its tracks, unable to continue copying. A stoppage of this sort spells death for the cell. But not all damage to DNA is critical and, to avoid the wholesale death of cells, a second type of DNA polymerase, one that i...

Diabetes research takes wing thanks to long-lived fruit fly

...es and proteins intact in the same way people hope substances like vitamins C and E might, few had considered that simply boosting the amount of JNK could have such a broad impact on life span. Then, in another surprise, Jasper and Bohmann showed that JNK targets the same protein as the widely studied insulin ...

Lack of key enzyme associated with development of rare tumor

... a lock. This action triggers the cell to produce substances known as cyclic nucleotides. These function as "second messengers," often stimulating the cell to begin an activity. In the case of adrenal cells, cyclic nucleotides, such as cyclic AMP and cyclic GMP, may stimulate cell growth or other activities....

Scientists take 'snapshots' of enzyme action

...ho led the research, most non-nutritional, foreign substances such as drugs and industrial chemicals are insoluble in water. The body uses two main groups of enzymes -- flavin-containing monooxygenases (FMOs) and cytochrome P450s -- to convert these compounds to soluble forms that can be easily excreted. "For ...

Allergy battle could be won in five years, says scientist

...sed on our earlier discovery of how allergens, the substances that cause allergy, enter the body through the surface layer of cells that protect the skin and the tubes of the lungs," he said. "Allergens from pollen or house dust mites are inhaled and then dissolve the binding material between the cells that f...

Ultra low-dose estrogen shown safe for post-menopausal women

... in pill form might stimulate the liver to produce substances that can lead to clotting or other adverse side effects. With a patch, you bypass the liver and go straight to the blood." Yaffe notes that since the WHI results were announced in 2004, "the field of estrogen research has been stymied. Hopefully, t...

Encoded metallic nanowires reveal bioweapons

...ns, Tok and his colleagues selected harmless model substances to stand in for anthrax spores, smallpox virus, and protein toxins such as ricin and botulinum toxin. If a simultaneous test for all of these is desired, the anthrax antibody would be attached to stripe pattern 1, the smallpox antibodies to stripe pa...

T cells activated to fight HIV basis for dendritic cell therapeutic vaccine

...were grown in culture with the addition of various substances to boost their potency. Separately, the researchers combined a small amount of the patient's HIV with their CD4 cells, in order to "super infect" them. In these now super-infected cells, the researchers inactivated the virus by promoting a process ca...

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