Seaweed and fireflies brew may guide stem cell treatment for peripheral artery disease

An unlikely brew of seaweed and glow-in-the-dark biochemical agents may hold the key to the safe use of transplanted stem cells to treat patients with severe peripheral arterial disease (PAD), according to a team of veterinarians, basic scientists and interventional radiologists at Johns Hopkins. ...

'Seeing' Stem Cells Helps in Fight Against Peripheral Arterial Disease

...he bubble remained alive. Researchers then induced the stem cells within the bubble to produce luciferase, a bioluminescence imaging agent produced by fireflies -- to "see" living stem cells. "We could 'see' the bubble via X-ray and tell if the stem cells remained alive as they lit up much like a firefly at ni...

Desert plant may hold key to surviving food shortage

...land be returned to food production." The genetic code of the plant will be deciphered using a DNA sequencing machine that uses an enzyme found in fireflies as a flash light to help read the DNA strand. ...

Tracking Cancer Drug's Effectiveness

...hers say they can cheaply and easily track how effective some cancer drugs are at cutting off a tumor's blood supply by using the same gene that gives fireflies their distinctive glow. Using a technique called bioluminescence imaging (BLI), the University of Teexas Southwestern Medical Center team added a m...

Fireflies' glow helps UT Southwestern researchers track cancer drug's effectiveness

... DALLAS May 29, 2008 The gene that allows fireflies to flash is helping researchers track the effectiveness of anti-cancer drugs over time. UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers are among the fi...

Fireflies help speed development of new drugs

... The glow that fireflies are famous for, are due to a glow molecule present in their bodies. This glow molecule is now helping illuminate the effectiveness of new medicines an...

Fireflies in Biological News

Fox Chase researchers uncover one force behind the MYC oncogene in many cancers

... that of the MYC gene, Testa and Jinfei Xu, PhD, a research associate in the laboratory, used a luciferase assay developed from the luciferase enzyme fireflies use to make light to see exactly where DLX5 protein binds to the promoter region of the MYC gene. They found that there were two sites where DLX5 cou...

CSHL team develops mouse models of leukemia that predict response to chemotherapy

...w and promoted the development of leukemia. To track leukemia onset and response to therapy, the scientists tagged all leukemia cells with a gene from fireflies that encodes an enzyme called luciferase, which makes leukemia cells glow and detectable by a ultrasensitive camera. Within weeks, the mice developed ...

Fireflies and jellyfish help illuminate quest for cause of infertility

... Genes taken from fireflies and jellyfish are literally shedding light on possible causes of infertility and autoimmune diseases in humans. Scientists are using the luminescen...

Scientists identify novel inhibitor of human microRNA

...ls in various cancers. The team designed an assay that contained the DNA binding sequence complementary to miR-21, bound to luciferase, the protein fireflies use to create light. Because miRNAs inhibit protein production, when miR-21 is functioning normally, it binds with the complementary sequence and inhi...

Atmospheric measuring device for understanding smog formation

..., and gives a sensitive, fast response. It works by detecting a "glowing" signal from a chemiluminescent compound - similar to the compound that makes fireflies glow - when it reacts with the hydroperoxyl radicals in atmospheric samples fed into the device during flight. "The chemiluminescence produced in s...

Biologists expose hidden costs of firefly flashes

...e lurking behind the magical light shows put on by fireflies each summer. Using both laboratory and field exper...21964 ), revealed that its energetically cheap for fireflies to produce their distinctive flash signals, but th...inner table. On summer evenings, male Photinus fireflies lift off into the air to broadcast their biolumine...

Small animal imaging facility is big boon to research

...aliber Life Sciences Corp., has enabled the lab to throw genetic expression into the mix. The optical scanning system uses luciferase, the same enzyme fireflies use to glow, to identify gene expression. "If you combine (luciferase) with certain genes and the genes are expressed, they glow, says Dr. Hu. For ...

Sea coral's trick helps scientists tag proteins

...GFP-like proteins in corals, Zimmer said. Before Lukyanov, no one had looked for GFP-like proteins in corals because they do not glow in the dark like fireflies and jellyfish. The corals' native green and red fluorescent proteins give off light only when stimulated by higher intensity light. Lukyanov's finding...

Firefly protein lets researchers monitor molecule linked to cancer

... Scientists have used a glowing protein from fireflies to observe the activity of a molecule that is an important target for new drugs to treat cancer, autoimmune diseases and several other disorders. Th...

Tufts researchers shine light on firefly mysteries

... provide misinformation to prospective mates. In other words, are some male fireflies lying in order to find romance? "If female mate choice is adaptive, we wo... Lewis and her then-doctoral student Christopher Cratsley found that female fireflies of one species (Photinus ignitus) are strongly attracted to males who give ...