Life Sciences and Chemistry

A multi-institutional team of scientists has gained important new knowledge about the regulatory role played in Alzheimer’s disease by Pin1, a protein that coaxes other proteins into untwisting. The research is published in the July 31 issue of Nature.

The team of researchers, including a group from the Department of Human Genetics at Emory University School of Medicine, examined slices of brain and found an inverse relationship between the abundance of Pin1 and both the susceptibili

Researchers have found they can control the size of densely packed DNA structures by changing the salt concentration in solutions containing DNA. The finding could improve the efficiency of gene delivery for medical treatment and disease prevention.

Scientists are seeking to understand the natural mechanism of DNA condensation into nanostructures — in particular, toroids, which look like tightly wound garden hoses. Densely packed DNA is nature’s efficient way of transporting genetic

A study by Princeton University scientists has shown that bacteria actively move around their environments to form social organizations. The researchers placed bacteria in minute mazes and found that they sought each other out using chemical signals.

Biologists have become increasingly aware of social interactions among bacteria, but previously believed that clusters formed only when bacteria randomly landed somewhere, then multiplied into dense populations. The discovery that they a

Northwestern University researchers have found that caspases, a family of protein-cutting enzymes involved in programmed cell death (apoptosis), may be a missing link in the chain of molecular events leading to Alzheimer´s disease.
Alzheimer´s disease is a neurodegenerative condition affecting an estimated 4 million Americans that causes memory loss and, ultimately, dementia. Patients with this disease have abnormal deposits (plaques) of protein fragments called amyloid-beta surrounding

Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas have discovered a way to inhibit a biochemical process that accompanies labor and to postpone delivery for one to two days in pregnant mice.

“Since the biochemical steps associated with labor are likely the same in both mice and humans, a similar treatment might someday help prevent pre-term labor in women,” said Dr. Carole Mendelson, professor of biochemistry and obstetrics and gynecology and senior author of the study, publish

A single gene, called PHANTASTICA (PHAN), controls whether a plant makes feathery leaves like a tomato or umbrella-like leaves like Oxalis. The same mechanism is shared by a wide group of flowering plants.

“It’s a very surprising finding, that modifying one gene in the tomato alters the leaf from one form to another,” said Neelima Sinha, a professor of plant biology at UC Davis who is senior author on the paper.

Plant leaves fall into two main groups: simple, single-bl