MES

Growth in the sea comes down to a struggle for iron

Scientists know that injecting iron into some major regions of the oceans can stimulate the growth of diatoms and other phytoplankton, but something odd occurs as these tiny marine plants continue to grow. They begin to starve in the midst of plenty, acting as though iron, an essential nutrient, still is in short supply. Why this happens is unclear, but the answer could be that iron sets off a ki...

Improved Outcomes Releases GeneLinker(TM) Gold and Platinum Version 4.6

Improved Outcomes Software (IOS) todayannounced the release of GeneLinker(TM) Gold and Platinum 4.6, newversions of the award-winning Gene Expression and Proteomics AnalysisSoftware products."The new releases are focused primarily on importing and analyzingprotein biomarker data, a high priority for many of our customers. Forexample, we have integrated the Protein Biomarker Package into the...

Needling Chromosomes Reveals Cell Division Secret

By impaling individual chromosomes with glassneedles one thousandth the diameter of a human hair, a Duke Universitygraduate student has tested their "stickiness" to one another duringcell division. Her uncanny surgical skills have added a piece to thelarge and intricate puzzle of how one cell divides into two -- aprocess fundamental to all organisms.In the Dec. 14, 2004, issue of Current Bi...

Multiple Campylobacter Genomes Sequenced

In 1995, the first complete bacterial genome sequence was published. Now, nearly 200 bacterial genomes have been completed, and a new one hits the scientific press most weeks. This burgeoning industry is not just scientific “stamp collecting,?however. Having all these genome sequences may provide useful clues about why some bacteria cause human disease, how to control their spread, and how to tre...

Variation in women's X chromosomes may explain differences among individuals, between sexes

The first comprehensive survey of gene activity in the X chromosomes of women has revealed an unexpected level of variation among individuals, according to new work by researchers at the Duke University Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy (IGSP) and Pennsylvania State University. The results may have important implications for understanding the differences in traits among women and...

BioMed Central welcomes the new National Institutes of Health public access policy

BioMed Central welcomes the announcement of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) new public access policy. The NIH calls on all of i...

Human Cells Filmed Instantly Messaging for First Time

Relief from soaring prices at the gas pump could come in the form of corncobs, cornstalks, switchgrass and other types of biomass, according to a joint feasibility study for the departments of Agriculture and Energy. The recently completed Oak Ridge National Laboratory report outlines a national strategy in which 1 billion dry tons of biomass ?any organic matter that is available on a rene...

Some Brain Cells 'Change Channels' To Fine-tune The Message

Johns Hopkins researchers have identified the proteins that allow specific brain cells to "change channels," a rare ability that tweaks what can come into the cell. The findings, described in the March 24 issue of Neuron, may let researchers harness the process, perhaps one day using it to protect cells that die in Lou Gehrig's disease. Much as turning the television dial changes what come...

To sea or not to sea: When it comes to salmon sex, size sometimes doesn't matter

The ones that stay and the ones that stray are biological puzzles among Pacific salmon, of whom the vast majority ?but not all ?travel thousands of miles to sea and back to the streams where they hatched. There are chinook salmon populations in Idaho in which an occasional male stays put and matures when only 6 inches long ?that is, he's able to fertilize eggs at even that diminutive size,...

Measuring Enzymes At End Of Cancer Pathway Predicts Outcome Of Tarceva, Taxol

Researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center have developed a way to test whether the new targeted therapy Tarceva and the widely used chemotherapy drug Taxol are effectively killing tumor cells. They say that with further refinement, the test may make it possible to accurately assess whether patients are responding to these agents, as well as potentially others, within day...

Agilent Technologies new genome analysis technology set to accelerate Australia fight against mesothelioma

Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) today announced that its breakthrough Human Genome CGH Microarray technology will be used by researchers at Melbourne's Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in a three-year study designed to better understand mesothelioma, a cancer found in the lining of the chest, the abdominal cavity and around the heart, usually caused by exposure to asbestos. Due to its act...

Molecular messengers perform a crucial role in the ability of injured nerve cells to heal themselves

Weizmann Institute findings might advance search for new therapies for injured nerve fibers. Long distance messengers star in many heroic tales, perhaps the most famous being the one about the runner who carried the news about the victory of the Greeks over the Persians in the fateful battle of Marathon. A team of researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science has now discovered how molecular m...

Scientists analyze chromosomes 2 and 4

A detailed analysis of chromosomes 2 and 4 has detected the largest "gene deserts" known in the human genome and uncovered more evidence that human chromosome 2 arose from the fusion of two ancestral ape chromosomes, researchers supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), reported today. In a study published in the Apr...

Second messenger NAADP shows fast, dose-related impact on satiety cycle

One traditional approach to pharmaceutical design uses so-called "first messengers" ?hormones, other natural facilitators or synthetic products ?to initiate various cellular cascades for the desired physiological effect. To date, despite concerted efforts at all levels of research, this approach has failed to develop a truly successful obesity drug to address this major global health problem....

UN: World in big ecological mess

The emergence of new diseases, sudden changes in water quality, creation of coastal "dead zones," the collapse of fisheries and shifts in regional climate are just some of the potential consequences of humankind's degradation of the planet's ecosystems, according to a new United Nations-backed report launched today. Humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively in the last 50...

Big differences in duplicated DNA distinguish chimp and human genomes

A study comparing the genomes of both humans and chimpanzees has found that much of the genetic difference between the two species came about in events called segmental duplications, in which segments of genetic code are copied many times in the genome. The study appears as a companion article to the draft sequence of the chimpanzee genome published in the Sept. 1 issue of the journal Nature....

When it comes to cell entry, being average has its advantages

When it comes to gaining entry into cells, size matters. A team from Brown University and the Max Planck Institute for Metals Research has created a model that explains how viruses and other bioparticles slip inside cells without a special protein coating called clathrin. The secret, it seems, is to be average. Mid-sized nanomaterials ?about 27 to 30 nanometers in diameter, or about 1,000...

Going To Extremes To Improve Human Health

A new research tool will allow University of Oregon scientists to replicate an extreme range of environmental conditions in their quest to test and understand the human body's response to everyday stresses. The instrument, called an environmental chamber, is a 12-foot-square room capable of simulating altitude up to 18,000 feet, holding temperature constant at a set point between 14 and 12...

What comes first…the chicken, the egg, or the bad attitude?

Researchers at the University of Alberta have discovered that chickens raised for meat can choose whether or not they'll funnel the nutrients they eat towards themselves or their eggs. That phenomenon of 'reproductive attitude' is a headache for producers who must figure out how to deal with less productive hens that "partition" nutrients needed for egg production into their own bodies. "...

Double trouble: Cells with duplicate genomes can trigger tumors

Abnormal cell division that yields cells with an extra set of chromosomes can initiate the development of tumors in mice, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have shown, validating a controversial theory about cancer causation put forth by a scientific visionary nearly 100 years ago. The so-called "double-value" cells are produced by random errors in cell division that occur with u...

Three deadly parasite genomes sequenced

Covering ship hulls with artificial shark skin could help ships sailing smoothly. The growth of marine organisms such as barnacles on ship hulls is a major cause of increased energy costs in the naval industry. Shark skin offers a structural design that prevents this so called 'bio-fouling'. Ralph Liedert from the University of Applied Sciences, Bremen, Germany, is presenting his work on t...

Researchers predict infinite genomes

TIGR scientists probe new pan-genome But scientists at The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR) have come to a startling conclusion. Armed with the powerful tools of comparative g...

UIC researchers show protein routes messages in nerve cells

Nerve cells relay messages at blink-of-the-eye speeds by squirting chemicals called neurotransmitters across tiny gaps called synapses to awaiting message receptors. But lots of different receptors and neurotransmitters work simultaneously. Which goes where to send the proper message? Research reported in the July 20 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience (released online July 13) by a team...

Gene for immune deficiency syndromes found

A newly discovered gene mutation may account for many cases of immune deficiency, in particular two syndromes known as immunoglobulin A (IgA) deficiency and Common Variable Immunodeficiency (CVID), report researchers in the July issue of Nature Genetics. The discovery may lead to a new diagnostic test for these conditions, which make people highly susceptible to infections and often go unrecogniz...

Breaking the mold: Research teams sequence three fungus genomes

From garden compost to forest greenery, the mold , scientists at The Inst...

Bugs expose underground carbon traffic system 10 times more important than fossil fuel burning

The flow of carbon through soil is ten times greater than the amount of carbon moved around by the burning of fossil fuel but until now how this happens was at best poorly understood. Soil was almost literally a black box to scientists interested in carbon. Now researchers at the University of Warwick have been able to shed light in that black box by getting a particular class of insects to expos...

2005 was the warmest year in a century

The year 2005 may have been the warmest year in a century, according to NASA scientists studying temperature data from around the world. Some other rese...

'Bad' enzymes may wear white hats after stroke

Enzymes that can harm the brain immediately after a stroke may actually be beneficial days later, according to new research. Insights from the study could change the way stroke is treated, extending the window for effective treatment from a couple of hours to a couple of weeks. The results may suggest new ideas for drug development. Working with rats, a team from the Harvard Medical Schoo...

Mouse to man: The story of chromosomes

The complete sequencing of human chromosome 17 and mouse chromosome 11 offers unique insights into the evolution of the genome of higher mammals, said a Baylor College of Medicine researcher who participated in this effort reported in today's issue of the journal Nature. The work represents the first time that a mouse chromosome has been completely sequenced and annotated, said Dr. James...

Exposure to volcanic mineral associated with increased mesothelioma incidence in Turkey

High exposure to a fibrous volcanic mineral called erionite was associated with a high incidence of a type of cancer called mesothelioma, according to a study in the March 15 issue of the Many cases of environment-related mesothelioma have been reported in the Cappadocia region or Anatolian plateau of Turkey. Blocks of erionite from volcani...

Data published in PNAS show antibodies can be made 10 times more toxic to cancer cells

Engineering the "Fc" region of monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) increases their toxicity to cancer cells, potentially improving the utility of targeted cancer therapies, according to research conducted at Xencor, which will be published in the March 14 print issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). Monoclonal antibodies have important advantages over chemotherapy a...

Computer scientist sorts out confusable drug names

Was that Xanex or Xanax? Or maybe Zantac? If you're a health care professional you'd better know the difference--mistakes can be fatal. An estimated 1.3 million people in the United States alone are injured each year from medication errors, and the U.S. Federal Drug Administration (FDA) has been working to reduce the possibilities of these errors, such as a documented case in which a patie...

Predicting successful outcomes in living-donor liver transplants

A new study on identifying which patients were likely to have poor outcomes following a living-donor liver transplant (LDLT) found that measuring how a certain non-toxic dye was eliminated by the liver shortly after surgery was an accurate indicator of liver function, and therefore a reliable indicator of the outcome of the procedure. The study used a simple non-invasive device to measure the dye...

New understanding of COX-1 and COX-2 enzymes could revise classification of pain meds

COX-1 and COX-2 enzymes may be blocked by pain medications such as Advil and Vioxx in a more complex manner than was previously understood, a Queen's University study has found. "The results of the study have potential implications for how we classify the commonly used anti-inflammatory and pain drugs for aches, pains, and fever," says Colin Funk, a professor of Biochemistry and Physiology...

DOE JGI releases IMG 1.5 with curated archaeal genomes

Version 1.5 of the Integrated Microbial Genomes (IMG) data management system of the U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI) has been released to the public. IMG 1.5 now contains a total of 741 genomes (435 bacterial, 32 archaeal, 15 eukaryotic genomes and 259 bacterial phages) of which 602 are finished and 139 are draft genomes. IMG 1.5 contains 62 finished and 100 dra...

What's shaped like a pear and has 2 genomes? Check the pond

If you could peer microscopically into the closest freshwater pond, you'd hesitate before dipping a toe. Amid the murky water, you'd probably notice an oddly furry, pear-shaped organism gliding along--and gobbling up everything in its path. --and a big fan club among scientists, as a star organism for research into how cell...

'Signature' of chromosome instability predicts cancer outcomes

Microscopic examination of tumor specimens cannot always predict a cancer's aggressiveness, leading to increased interest in molecular approaches to diagnosis. Now, researchers in the Children's Hospital Informatics Program (CHIP) at the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology report that a genetic profile indicating chromosomal instability -- an increased tendency to develop chrom...

Gene expression becomes heterogeneous with age in humans and rats

In a study of the effects of aging on gene expression, researchers have found that variation in gene expression among individuals tends to increase with age. The findings, which impact our understanding of the molecular forces that govern age-related changes, are reported in the May 23rd issue of Current Biology by Mehmet Somel and colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropol...

For diseases, when it comes to sharing a home, only close relatives will do

Being more generous to close relatives is a common theme in both our daily interactions and our understanding of how organisms resolve conflicts in nature. In a paper from July issue of The American Naturalist, biologists Britt Koskella (Indiana University), Tatiana Giraud (Université Paris-Sud), and Michael Hood (University of Virginia) asked whether similar rules apply to disease-causing microb...

Giant deep-sea tubeworm's meal ticket comes in as a skin infection

Giant tubeworms found near hydrothermal ventsmore than a mile below the ocean surface donot bother to eat: lacking mouth and stomach,they stand rooted to one spot. Fornourishment, they rely completely onsymbiotic bacteria that live within theirbodies to metabolize the sulphurous volcanicsoup in which they both thrive. But the microscopic larvae of these giantsare born bacteria-free, with a...