Life Sciences and Chemistry

Researchers trim count of human genes to 20,000-25,000

The International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium, led in the United States by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) and the Department of Energy (DOE), today published its scientific description of the finished human genome sequence, reducing the estimated number of human protein-coding genes from 35,000 to only 20,000-25,000, a surprisingly low number for our species.

The paper appears in the Oct.

The revolution was not televised.

In the fall of 1999, the Stanford Microarray Database booted up, and a level of computing power was suddenly available to the field of molecular biology that only a few years earlier was inconceivable. On Oct. 19, the database recorded its 50,000th experiment, marking its place at the forefront of an information processing revolution that has yielded groundbreaking insights into the relationships between genes and illness, as well as fundamental

Finding may reveal clues to origins of autism, other human brain disorders

High stress levels during infancy and early childhood can lead to the poor development of communication zones in brain cells – a condition found in mental disorders such as autism, depression and mental retardation.

These are the findings of Dr. Tallie Z. Baram and her collaborators at the UC Irvine College of Medicine, Neurocrine Biosciences, Inc., and the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry. For t

Research team from Italy makes presentation on project at Congress of Neurological Surgeons Annual Meeting

A team of neurosurgeons and scientists from Italy is looking into whether stem cells derived from a brain tumor patient’s own skin can be used to fight the tumors. The researchers successfully grew stem cells from skin samples of adult patients with brain tumors. It is hoped that these cells can then be used as a new brain tumor therapy, which has been attempted successfully

Research team from cleveland makes presentation on findings at Congress of Neurological Surgeons annual meeting

It had long been thought that once the human brain is fully matured, no new brain cells develop. Now a team of researchers and scientists has found evidence of cell generation in the brains of adults with epilepsy and say it could lead to ground-breaking treatment for the disease. William Bingaman, M.D., a neurosurgeon from the Cleveland Clinic, presented his findings at

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine have discovered the gene for a form of Joubert Syndrome, a condition present before birth that affects an area of the brain controlling balance and coordination in about 1 in 10,000 individuals. Their study, published in the November 2004 issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics*, pointed to mutations in a gene called AHI1 that lead to the production of a protein the scientists named Jouberin.