Life Sciences and Chemistry

Much like moving furniture around to create more space, cells dramatically rearrange their entire genome in order to allow the right genes to be turned on at the right time, new research at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill shows.

This extensive chromosomal “remodeling” is accomplished by moving DNA packaging structures called nucleosomes to different spots in the genome. Once a nucleosome is moved from a site, the appropriate gene then can be expressed much more effici

When molecules in cells are stimulated by light, they respond by becoming excited and re-emitting light of varying colors (fluorescence) that can be captured and measured by highly sensitive optical equipment.

Now, researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and the University of Southern California are developing miniaturized spectroscopic instruments and computer software to take a real-time look at biochemical, functional and structural changes occurring within the cells and tissu

The fact that each white whale has individual voice is established by Russian scientists conducting research in the White Sea. Differences between white whales’ voices can be used in estimating their number.

“White whale individuals can be distinguished by the sound of voice practically like humans,” – tell V.M. Bel’kovich and S.A. Kreichi from the Shirshov Institute of Oceanology. The scientists observe the animals every year in the White Sea by the Bolshoi Solovetskii Isl

Isolated soy protein added to the diets of 14 men, all military veterans under treatment for advanced stages of type 2 diabetes, significantly lowered unwanted proteins in their urine and slightly raised desired HDL cholesterol levels in their blood, researchers say.

The two improved areas are linked to kidney disease and coronary heart disease, respectively, in patients with type 2 diabetes. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that 18 million Americans have diabetes, with more than 9

Hotspots in two areas of a gene that encodes a specific signaling enzyme, or kinase, are vulnerable to a variety of mutations found in five types of brain cancers, according to a report published in the August 1 issue of the journal Cancer Research.

Mutations in the gene PIK3CA occur spontaneously as part of the brain tumor development rather than being passed genetically between generations, said Hai Yan, M.D., Ph.D., the senior scientist of the studies conducted by a collaborativ

Scientists at The Hospital for Sick Children (Sick Kids), Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have made the unexpected discovery that significant differences can exist in the overall content of DNA and genes contained in individual genomes. These findings, which point to possible new explanations for individual uniqueness as well as why disease develops, are published in the September 2004 issue of the scientific journal Nature Genetics (available online August 1