Life Sciences and Chemistry

New tool offers scientists great flexibility

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researchers have successfully targeted unnatural sugar molecules with chemically unique functional groups onto the surfaces of cells in living animals without altering the animals’ physiology.
The achievement is a significant advance in the promising new field of metabolic engineering because it provides a new tool with which researchers can label specific cells in whole animals so that they can dif

Researchers at the University of Minnesota have identified, for the first time, a gene variation associated with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), a complex, inflammatory autoimmune disease that affects multiple organs. The gene variation, known as PTPN22, is found in approximately 16 percent (or one in six) of healthy Caucasians in the United States. However, nearly one in four (or 23 percent) lupus patients carry this variant, which has also now been associated with risk for type 1 diabetes and r

The wind transports pollen far less effectively than scientists assumed, according to a new study of invasive Atlantic cordgrass by researchers at UC Davis. This discovery will help control a cordgrass, Spartina alterniflora, that is invading wetlands on the Pacific coast.

Plants including grasses, oaks and pine trees need the wind to carry pollen between plants, fertilizing nascent seeds. Scientists guessed that wind pollination was efficient, but the theory hadn’t been tested.

With increasing numbers of whole genomes being sequenced, researchers are keen to analyse the functions of the genes they contain and the proteins these genes encode. Yet, according to researchers writing in BMC Biology, to fully understand any genome, researchers must use palaeontology, geology and chemistry to help them discover the reasons why specific genes evolved.

Steven Benner and Eric Gaucher at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution, Frank and Rosalie Simmen at the U

University of Leeds genetics researchers are part of an international project to determine the genome sequence of the fast-growing moss, Physcomitrella patens. Understanding how this British weed works will help scientists get to the root of how other species live and grow and, potentially, improve their resilience.

The quick-growing moss has been used in plant research for over 30 years as it’s easy to cultivate in laboratories. Genetic information from the project will help

A gigantic protein complex responsible for looking after bent out of shape proteins has been visualised by scientists working in Japan and the UK.

The structure of the chaperonin complex of the bacteria Thermus thermophilus reveals clues about how the important molecule may do its job of folding new or damaged proteins within cells. Led by Professor So Iwata of Imperial College London, the team of scientists announce their findings in this month’s edition of the journal Structu