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Carnegie Mellon scientists develop tool that uses MRI to visualize gene expression in living animals

In a first, Carnegie Mellon University scientists have "programmed" cells to make their own contrast agents, enabling unprecedented high-resolution, deep-tissue imaging of gene expression. The results, appearing in the April issue of Nature Medicine, hold considerable promise for conducting preclinical studies in the emerging field of molecular therapeutics and for monitoring the delivery of ther...

Robot-based system developed at Carnegie Mellon detects life in Chile's Atacama desert

A unique rover-based life detection system developed by Carnegie Mellon University scientists has found signs of life in Chile's Atacama Desert, according to results being presented at the 36th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference March 14-18 in Houston. This marks the first time a rover-based automated technology has been used to identify life in this harsh region, which serves as a test bed f...

Green catalyst destroys pesticides and munitions toxins, finds Carnegie Mellon University

Results reported at American Chemical Society meetingA chemical catalyst developed at Carnegie Mellon University completely destroys dangerous nitrophenols in laboratory tests, according to Arani Chanda, a doctoral student who is presenting his findings on Sunday, Aug. 28, at the 230th meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) in Washington, D.C. (Division of Industrial and Engineering Chemi...

OHSU research shows vitamin C counteracts some negative impacts of smoking on unborn babies

Research conducted in monkeys at the Oregon National Primate Research Center, Oregon Health & Science University, suggests high doses of vitamin C may have potential to counteract some negative impacts of smoking in unborn babies. The research may benefit thousands of babies born to mothers who continue to smoke throughout pregnancy despite physician warnings. The research is published in the...

Carnegie Mellon University research reveals how cells process large genes

Important messages require accurate transmission. Big genes are especially challenging because they combine many coding segments (exons) that lie between long stretches of non-coding elements (introns). During processing, introns are snipped out and exons pasted together to form a template for proteins called messenger RNA (mRNA). Mistakes in RNA processing can reduce the expression of a function...

Insight into the processes of 'positive' and 'negative' learners

A breakthrough in human stem cell research, producing embryonic-like cells from umbilical cord blood may substantially speed up the development of treatments for life-threatening illnesses, injuries and disabilities. The discovery made during a project undertaken with experts from the University of Texas Medical Branch and the Synthecon Corporation in the United States provides medical researcher...

Carnegie Mellon cyLab researchers work to develop new red tide monitoring

Carnegie Mellon CyLab computer scientist Yang Cai is working with NASA's Earth-Sun System Technology Office (ESTO), the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to develop new software for detecting and tracking toxic algae plaguing North American waters. "We are developing software that will monitor dangerous algae and various bioch...

A New Era Of Hope For Neglected Diseases

After a barren period when very few therapies were introduced for neglected diseases, which kill around 3m people a year and cause the loss of the equivalent of 92m years' of healthy life, there are now over 60 drug research projects underway. In the PLoS Medicine analysis, which is based upon a 100-page report financed by the Wellcome Trust, Mary Moran of the London School of Economics fo...

Team led by Carnegie Mellon University scientist finds first evidence of a living memory trace

An international team of scientists for the first time has detected a memory trace in a living animal after it has encountered a single, new stimulus. The research, done with honeybees sensing new odors, allows neuroscientists to peer within the living brain and explore short-term memory as never before, according to scientist Roberto Fernández Galán, a leading author on the report who is current...

A New Era of Hope for the World's Most Neglected Diseases

International health agencies have designated a group of 13 tropical infections as neglected diseases (Kala-azar (leishmaniasis), African Sleeping Sickness (African trypanosomiasis), Chagas Disease (American trypanosomiasis), Schistosomiasis, Lymphatic Filariasis (elephantiasis), Onchocerciasis (river blindness), Drancunculiasis (guinea worm), Soil-transmitted Helminthiases, Leprosy, Buruli Ulcer...

Carnegie Mellon scientists create PNA molecule with potential to build nanodevices

No matter how healthy a life one leads, no person has managed to live much longer than a century. Even though the advances of the modern age may have extended the average human life span, it is clear there are genetic limits to longevity. One prominent theory of aging lays the blame on the accumulation of damage done to DNA and proteins by “free radicals,?highly reactive molecules produced by the...

Carnegie Mellon U. transforms DNA microarrays with standard Internet communications tool

A standard Internet protocol that checks errors made during email transmissions has now inspired a revolutionary method to transform DNA microarray analysis, a common technology used to understand gene activation. The new method, which blends experiment and computation, strengthens DNA microarray analysis, according to its Carnegie Mellon University inventor, who is publishing his findings in the...

Carnegie Mellon develops non-invasive technique to detect transplant rejection at cellular level

Carnegie Mellon University scientist Chien Ho and his colleagues have developed a promising tool that uses magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to track immune cells as they infiltrate a transplanted heart in the early stages of organ rejection. This pre-clinical advance, described in an upcoming issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), ultimately could provide a non-invas...

Carnegie Mellon scientists show brain uses optimal code for sound

Scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have discovered that our ears use the most efficient way to process the sounds we hear, from babbling brooks to wailing babies. These results represent a significant advance in our understanding of how sound is encoded for transmission to the brain, according to the authors, whose work is published with an accompanying "News and Views" editorial in the Feb...

DNA conclusive yet still controversial, Carnegie Mellon professor says

Although the odds that DNA evidence found at a crime scene will match by chance the DNA of a person who was not there are infinitesimal, controversy continues about DNA identification and its use in criminal investigations, says Carnegie Mellon University Statistics Professor Kathryn Roeder. Roeder will present a historical overview of the use of DNA identification on Tuesday, April 25, during th...

U-M researchers take new approach to defeating Gram-negative bugs

Ronald Woodard's team set out looking for a way to kill a stubborn type of bacteria and they succeeded---but not in the way he expected. Woodard is senior author of an article describing way he and his...

Teens unaware of sexually transmitted diseases until they catch one, Carnegie Mellon study finds

Most sexually active teenage girls know relatively little about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) until it is too late, according to a paper by Carnegie Mellon University researchers that will be published in the January edition of the Journal of Adolescent Health. "For the most part kids learn about sexually transmitted diseases when they are getting diagnosed with them," said Julie Do...

Carnegie Mellon researchers discover new cell properties

Carnegie Mellon University researchers Kris Noel Dahl and Mohammad F. Islam have made a new breakthrough for children suffering from an extremely rare disease that accelerates the aging process by about seven times the normal rate. Dahl, an assistant professor of chemical and biomedical engineering at Carnegie Mellon, said her work with researchers at the National Cancer Institute of the N...

Carnegie Mellon researchers discover key deficiencies in brains of people with autism

In a pair of groundbreaking studies, brain scientists at Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh have discovered that the anatomical differences that characterize the brains of people with autism are related to the way those brains process information. Previous studies have demonstrated a lower degree of synchronization among activated brain areas in people with autis...

Mechanism for neurodenegerative diseases linked to transport proteins

Hampering the transport of proteins within cells may underlie several adult-onset neurodegenerative diseases, such as Huntington's, ALS and Kennedy disease. Understanding how this cell transport is blocked in these diseases may offer targets for future therapy. In a new study published online June 4 in Nature Neuroscience, researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago College of M...

Public Library of Science to launch new, open access journal on neglected tropical diseases

The Public Library of Science (PLoS) announced today the creation of PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, the first open access journal devoted to the world's most neglected diseases. ) will focus on the overlooked diseases that strike millions of people every year in poor countries, including elephantias...

Carnegie Mellon scientists use 'green' approach to transform plastics manufacturing

Using environmentally safe compounds like sugars and vitamin C, scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have vastly improved a popular technology used to generate a diverse range of industrial plastics for applications ranging from targeted drug delivery systems to resilient paint coatings. The revolutionary improvement in atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) now enables large-scal...

Genetic surprise confirms neglected 70-year-old evolutionary hypothesis

Biologists at the University of Rochester have discovered that an old and relatively unpopular theory about how a single species can split in two turns out to be accurate after all, and acting in nature. The finding, reported in today's issue of Science, reveals that scientists must reassess the process involved in the origin of species. The beginnings of speciation, suggests the paper, ca...

Negative effects of caffeine are stronger on daytime sleep than on nocturnal sleep

A new study at the Université de Montréal has concluded that people drinking coffee to get through a night shift or a night of studying will strongly hurt their recovery sleep the next day. The study published in the current issue of Neuropsychopharmacology was conducted by Dr. Julie Carrier from the Department of Psychology at the Université de Montréal. Dr. Carrier runs the Chronobiology Labora...

Carnegie Mellon University research shows how sensory-deprived brain compensates

Whiskers provide a mouse with essential information to negotiate a burrow or detect movement that could signal a predator's presence. These stiff hairs relay sensory input to the brain, which shapes neuronal activity. In a first, studies of this system by Carnegie Mellon scientists show just how well a mouse brain can compensate when limited to sensing the world through one whisker. Published Apr...

Renegade RNA -- Clues to cancer and normal growth

Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that a tiny piece of genetic code apparently goes where no bit of it has gone before, and it gets there under its own internal code. MicroRNAs, already implicated in cancer and normal development, latch on to and gum...

Carnegie Mellon scientists find key HIV protein makes cell membranes bend more easily

PITTSBURGH -- Carnegie Mellon University scientists have made an important discovery that aids the understanding of why HIV enters immune cells with ease. The researchers found that after HIV docks onto a host cell, it dramatically lowers the energy required for a cell membrane to bend, making it easier for the virus to infect immune cells. The finding, in press in Biophysical Journal, will pr...