Posted: 10/2/2016
- Universal flu vaccine designed by scientists (“The components of this vaccine would be short flu virus fragments -- called epitopes -- that are already known to be recognized by the immune system. Our collaboration has found a way to select epitopes reaching full population coverage. … only use previously-tested epitopes.”)
- Study provides strongest evidence oxygen levels were key to early animal evolution (“The new study is the first to distinguish between bodies of water with low and high levels of oxygen. It shows that poorly oxygenated waters did not support the complex life that evolved immediately prior to the Cambrian period, suggesting the presence of oxygen was a key factor in the appearance of these animals.”)
- Making babies without eggs may be possible, say scientists (I would guess that natural birth will become a thing of the past in the next 20-50 years)
- Team Reverses Alcohol Dependence in Animal Models (“... built on previous studies showing that frequent alcohol use can activate specific groups of neurons. The more a person drinks, the more they reinforce activation in the neuronal “circuit,” which then drives further alcohol use and addiction. It’s like the brain carves a special path between alcohol and reward. … In both humans and rats, these neurons make up only about five percent of the neurons in the brain’s central amygdala. … The rats were then injected with a compound that could specifically inactivate only alcohol-linked neurons. … these rats completely cease their compulsive alcohol drinking … an effect that strong that has lasted for several weeks ... The researchers went on run the experiment a second, and then a third time. Each time, the rats ceased drinking compulsively. … like they forgot they were dependent … Interestingly, these rats were still motivated to drink sugar water, indicating that the researchers had successfully targeted only alcohol-activated neurons, not the brain’s overall reward system. The rats also appeared to be protected from the negative physical symptoms of alcohol withdrawal, such as shaking.”)
- From leaf to itch Harvard-led research team first to track molecular path of poison ivy (“the role of a key molecule called CD1a in a chain reaction that begins when the shiny leaf touches the skin. Until now, that molecule’s role lay in a scientific blind spot created because ordinary lab mice — crucial to immunology study — don’t produce CD1a. … took advantage of mice engineered to produce the molecule by colleagues at Kyoto University, which enabled observation of the entire inflammatory pathway for the first time. ... Psoriasis sufferers could benefit from the findings, as the newly outlined inflammatory process has elements similar to those found in the skin diseas”)
- New genus of bacteria found living inside hydraulic fracturing wells (“But that's not the case with the newly identified Candidatus Frackibacter, which may be unique to hydraulic fracturing sites … The microorganisms living in the shale must tolerate high temperature, pressure and salinity, … salinity is likely the most important stressor on the microbes' survival. Salinity forces the microbes to synthesize organic compounds called osmoprotectants to keep themselves from bursting. When the cells die, the osmoprotectants are released into the water, where other microbes can use them for protection themselves or eat them as food.”)
- Quantum mechanics technique allows for pushing past 'Rayleigh's curse' and Tapping into light's hidden information to push fundamental diffraction limit (“The work by the team follows an earlier effort using another technique and is different from other techniques that also overcome the Rayleigh limit that other teams have been reporting. … even if two close incoherent sources emit simultaneously, measurements with linear optics and photon counting can estimate their separation from the far field almost as precisely as conventional methods do for isolated sources, rendering Rayleigh's criterion irrelevant to the problem. Our results demonstrate that superresolution ...”)
- Resetting the Body's Thermostat with a Molecular On/Off Switch By taking control of the thermoregulatory process, researchers are uncovering how mammals maintain body temperature (“The new research suggests one way that warm-sensitive neurons could monitor and influence body temperature—via a temperature-sensitive protein called TRPM2.”)
- Scientists take big step toward recreating primordial 'RNA world' of 4 billion years ago (“The best performer after two dozen rounds of selection, polymerase ribozyme 24-3, proved capable of synthesizing not only the two target-binding RNAs but also several other structurally complex RNA molecules that exist in nature—as functional remnants of the ancient RNA world—including a yeast version of a "transfer RNA" molecule that has an essential protein-making role in all cells.”)
- Revolutionary computer program could change chemistry forever (“Making a complex product, be it a blockbuster drug or a DNA base, from simple building blocks is a battle. Researchers often have to recall reactions or mechanisms from memory and consult the literature to map out a synthesis. Even then, there are no guarantees it will work, the path often littered with low yields, escalating costs and non-existent chemicals.”)
- Virus-infected plants are more alluring to bumble (“the cucumber mosaic virus (CMV). CMV alters the gene expression of the tomato plants it infects, stunting their growth and distorting their leaves, and it can cause severe losses of crops worldwide. It also causes the plant to emit a different scent than non-infected tomatoes”)
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