Biological

Another Look Finds Promising Proteomics Test is Not Biologically Plausible

In a new study, researchers present a “cautionary tale?about what may go wrong when using the fledgling science of proteomics to devise a diagnostic test for cancer. In the February 16 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, researchers from The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center detail why an experimental test intended to identify early ovarian cancer from a...

NYU researchers simulate molecular biological clock

For many years, DNA and proteins have beenviewed as the real movers and shakers in genomic studies, with RNA seenas little more than a messenger that shuttles information between thetwo. But researchers from Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Researchand Massachusetts Institute of Technology have discovered that smallRNA molecules called microRNAs regulate thousands of human genes--morethan...

Automatic extraction of gene/protein biological functions from biomedical text

With the rapid advancement of biomedical science and the development of high-throughput analysis methods, the extraction of various types of information from biomedical text has become critical. Since automatic functional annotations of genes are quite useful for interpreting large amounts of high-throughput data efficiently, the demand for automatic extraction of information related to gene func...

DuPont's first biologically derived polymer receives global recognition

DuPont's newest polymer innovation, the first DuPont polymer derived from a biological source, has been recognized by the China State Intellectual Property Office and China Central Television (CCTV) as "Most Visionary Innovation" at a recent award ceremony. will receive the 2005 "New Technologies in Re...

Glow-in-the-dark zebrafish at UH hold keys to biological clocks

Using genetically altered zebrafish that glow in the dark, University of Houston researchers have found new tools that shed light upon biological clock cycles. Gregory M. Cahill, associate professor of biology and biochemistry at UH, and Maki Kaneko, a fellow UH researcher who is now at the University of California-San Diego, presented their findings in a paper titled "Light-dependent Dev...

Discovery clarifies role of peptide in biological clock

A biologist at Washington University in St. Louis is giving the VIP treatment to laboratory mice in hopes of unraveling more clues about our biological clock. Erik Herzog, Ph.D., Washington Un...

Ariadne Genomics Announces the Release of PathwayStudio?Central, Client-Server Software for Biological Pathway Analysis

Ariadne Genomics, Inc. today announced the release of PathwayStudio?Central, client-server software for visualization and analysis of biological pathways and gene regulation networks for bio-medical research labs, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. PathwayStudio?Central is available for a free 20 day trial at www.ariadnegenomics.com. PathwayStudio?Central builds pathways from micr...

A new way to share models of biological systems

Today sees the launch of BioModels, the world's first database of annotated biological models. BioModels is the result of a collaboration led by the European Bioinformatics Institute (UK) and the SBML Team, an international group that develops open-source standards to describe biological systems. Other contributors include the Keck Graduate Institute (USA), the Systems Biology Institute (Japan) a...

Engineers improve plastic's potential for use in implants by linking it to biological material

Engineers at The University of Texas at Austin have found a way to modify a plastic to anchor molecules that promote nerve regeneration, blood vessel growth or other biological processes. In the study led by Dr. Christine Schmidt, the researchers identified a piece of protein from among a billion candidates that could perform the unusual feat of attaching to polypyrrole, a synthetic polym...

New book expands biological classifications to account for 'alien' life

What would you call an alien if you encountered it on the street tomorrow? What if that alien didn't come from another world but rather was created in a laboratory right here on Earth and functioned differently from other Earth life? Either way, Peter Ward has the beginnings of an answer. In a new book, the University of Washington paleontologist puts forth an expanded "tree of life," or b...

Technique offers new view of dynamic biological landscape

A new technique for analyzing the network of genetic interactions promises to change how researchers study the dynamic biological landscape of the cell. The technology, which is called epistatic mini array profiles (E-MAP), has already been used to assign new functions to known genes, to uncover the roles of previously uncharacterized proteins, and to define how biochemical pathways and proteins...

UC Berkeley researchers create a biologically-inspired artificial compound eye

Using the eyes of insects such as dragonflies and houseflies as models, a team of bioengineers at University of California, Berkeley, has created a series of artificial compound eyes. These eyes can eventually be used as cameras or sensory detectors to capture visual or chemical information from a wider field of vision than previously possible, even with the best fish-eye lens, said Luke P...

Nano machine switches between biological and silicon worlds

"Frankly, some researchers didn't think what we were attempting was possible," says Dr Keith Firman, at Portsmouth University and Mol-Switch project coordinator, funded under the European Commission's Future and Emerging Technologies initiative. "However, we got our molecular switch to work." The upshot is that the Mol-Switch project was far more successful than expected. The team's switch...

New possibilities to fight pests with biological means

Corn plants emit a cocktail of scents when they are attacked by certain pests, such as a caterpillar known as the Egyptian cotton leaf worm. Parasitic wasps use these plant scents to localize the caterpillar and deposit their eggs on it, so that their offspring can feed on the caterpillar. Soon after, the caterpillar dies and the plant is relieved from its attacker. In the case of corn, o...

More evidence mammals, fruit flies share make-up on function of biological clocks

A study by researchers at New York University and the University of London offers additional evidence that mammals and fruit flies share a common genetic makeup that determines the function of their internal biological clocks. The research team consisted of post-doctoral researcher Ben Collins, Esteban Mazzoni, a graduate student, and Assistant Professor Justin Blau of NYU's Department of...

Novel connection found between biological clock and cancer

Dartmouth Medical School geneticists have discovered that DNA damage resets the cellular circadian clock, suggesting links among circadian timing, the cycle of cell division, and the propensity for cancer. Their work, reported June 29 in Science Express, the advance electronic publication of Science, implies a protective dimension for the biological clock in addition to its pacemaker funct...

Can biological traits predict diversification rates in birds?

Why do some taxanomic families contain many species and others contain far fewer? There has been much debate in the scientific community over the reason for such variation, but a recent study in The American Naturalist by Albert B. Phillimore (Imperial College London, Silwood Park Campus), Robert P. Freckleton (Oxford University), C. David L. Orme (Imperial College London, Silwood Park Campus),...

Biological motors sort molecules one by one on a chip

Researchers from Delft University of Technology's Kavli Institute of Nanoscience have discovered how to use the motors of biological cells in extremely small channels on a chip. Based on this, they built a transport system that uses electrical charges to direct the molecules individually. To demonstrate this, the Delft researchers sorted the individual molecules according to their color. Professo...

Protein shown to rally biological clock

A biologist at Washington University in St. Louis and his collaborators have identified the factor in mammalian brain cells that keeps cells in synchrony so that functions like the wake-sleep cycle, hormone secretion and loco motor behaviors are coordinated daily over a 24-hour period. Erik Herzog, Ph.D., Washington University associate professor of Biology in Arts & Sciences, Sara Ato...

Researchers to develop active nanoscale surfaces for biological separations

A team of researchers has received a four-year, $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation to study improved methods for biological separations. Led by Ravi Kane, the Merck Associate Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the group plans to develop nanoscale surfaces that actively reassemble in the presence of DNA, which could eventually l...

Fantastic Voyage: A new nanoscale view of the biological world

Echoing the journey through the human body in Fantastic Voyage, doctors might soon be able to track individual donor cells after a transplant, or to find where and how much of a cancer treatment drug there is within a cell. New technology described in a study published today in the open access journal Journal of Biology makes it possible to image and quantify molecules within individual mammalian...

Theory of oscillations may explain biological mysteries

New mathematical studies of the interactions between oscillating biological populations may shed light on some of the toughest questions in ecology, including the number and types of species in an ecosystem, according to an article in the December 2006 issue of BioScience. The article, by John Vandermeer of the University of Michigan, shows how extensions of established theory suggest that many a...

Osteoarthritis may be sign of faster 'biological ageing'

Osteoarthritis, the degenerative inflammatory bone disease, may be a sign of faster "biological ageing," suggests research published ahead of print in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases. X-rays of both hands were taken of all participants to check for signs...

A potential biological cause for sudden infant death syndrome

New autopsy data provide the strongest evidence yet that sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) is not a "mystery" disease but has a concrete biological basis. In the November 1 issue of JAMA, researchers at Children's Hospital Boston document abnormalities in the brainstem ?a part of the brain that regulates breathing, blood pressure, body heat, and arousal ?in babies who died from SIDS. S...

Biologically inspired sensors can augment sonar, vision system in submarines

To find prey and avoid being preyed upon, fish rely on a row of specialized sensory organs along the sides of their bodies, called the lateral line. Now, a research team led by Chang Liu at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has built an artificial lateral line that can provide the same functions in underwater vehicles. "Our development of an artificial lateral line is aimed at...

Whiteflies and plant viruses can help each other to speed up biological invasion

An invasive whitefly has developed mutualistic relationships with the plant viruses it transmits and is able to increase its population much faster on virus-infected plants than on healthy plants, whereas its indigenous counterpart is unable to do so, according to the new research carried out at Zhejiang University and Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, China. Twenty years ago in 19...