Curated News: Nature (journal)

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New DNA regulatory technique modifies the environment around a single gene to control gene expression and behavioral consequences

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Chemists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) and the Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry have described a method for creating and modifying organic compounds that overcomes a major limitation of previous methods.

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UCLA scientists have discovered that statins, a popular class of cholesterol drugs, reverse the learning deficits caused by a mutation linked to a common genetic cause of learning disabilities. Published in the Nov. 10 advance online edition of Nature Neuroscience, the findings were studied in mice genetically engineered to develop the disease, called Noonan syndrome.

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Scientists have made the first direct observations of a one-dimensional boundary separating two different, atom-thin materials, enabling studies of long-theorized phenomena at these interfaces.

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A new method of developing vaccines could point the way forward in the fight against infectious diseases for which traditional vaccination has failed, according to a new Rutgers study. The method involves training white blood cells that have not previously been the primary focus of vaccine development. William Gause, senior associate dean for research at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, led the study, which recently was published in the journal Nature Immunology.

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Within weeks of publishing surprising new insights about how zebrafish get their stripes, the same University of Washington group is now able to explain how to "erase" them.

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UAB epidemiologist Christine Skibola helped lead a search for genetic and environmental links to lymphomas, resulting in the largest epidemiology and genome-wide association studies of non-Hodgkin lymphoma ever conducted.

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A fundamental step-change involving an increase in funding and political commitment is urgently needed to ensure that protected areas deliver their full conservation, social and economic potential, according to an article published today in Nature by experts from Wildlife Conservation Society, the University of Queensland, and the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA).

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For years, a multidisciplinary team of Johns Hopkins researchers has tracked an elusive creature, a complex of proteins thought to be at fault in some cases of sudden cardiac death. As they report Nov. 5 in the online edition of Nature Communications, they have finally captured images of the complex. Those images reveal the connection between some genetic mutations and electrical abnormalities of the heart and provide a starting point for designing therapies.

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In an era of reduced funding, it’s not enough for a young researcher to be a good scientist. He or she also needs “street smarts” to, for example, find an influential mentor, dress professionally, network during scientific meetings and be able to describe a research project in the time it takes to ride an elevator.

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Scientists today disclosed a new method to convert lignin, a biomass waste product, into simple chemicals. The innovation is an important step toward replacing petroleum-based fuels and chemicals with biorenewable materials, says Shannon Stahl, an expert in “green chemistry” at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

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Lihong Wang, PhD, the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the School of Engineering & Applied Science is applying a novel time-reversal technology that allows researchers to better focus light in tissue, such as muscles and organs.

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Researchers studying iron-based superconductors are combining novel electronic structure algorithms with the high-performance computing power of the Titan supercomputer to predict spin dynamics, or the ways electrons orient and correlate their spins in a material.

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Hollow coring drills designed and managed by UW-Madison’s Ice Drilling Design and Operations (IDDO) program are used to extract ice cores that can analyze the past atmosphere. Shaun Marcott, an assistant professor of geoscience at UW-Madison, was the first author of a paper published today in the journal Nature documenting carbon dioxide in the atmosphere between 23,000 and 9,000 years ago, based on data from an 11,000-foot hole in Antarctica.

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Mimicking natural evolution in a test tube, scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have devised an enzyme with a unique property that might have been crucial to the origin of life on Earth.

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Scores of autoimmune diseases afflicting one in 12 Americans — ranging from type 1 diabetes, to multiple sclerosis (MS), to rheumatoid arthritis, to asthma — mysteriously cause the immune system to harm tissues within our own bodies. Now, a new study pinpoints the complex genetic origins for many of these diseases, a discovery that may lead to better diagnosis and ultimately to improved treatments.

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Two major genetic studies of autism, led in part by UC San Francisco scientists and involving more than 50 laboratories worldwide, have newly implicated dozens of genes in the disorder. The research shows that rare mutations in these genes affect communication networks in the brain and compromise fundamental biological mechanisms that govern whether, when, and how genes are activated overall.

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Scientists using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have detected a streamer of dust and gas flowing from a massive outer disk toward the inner reaches of a binary star system. This never-before-seen feature may be responsible for sustaining a second, smaller disk of planet-forming material that otherwise would have disappeared long ago.

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Newfound Genetic Differences Provide Many Hints at Causes

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A new study on a large cohort of kidney cancer patients in Europe sheds light on the genetic architecture of the disease -- and reveals an apparent link between exposure to aristolochic acid and incidence of kidney cancer, particularly in Romania.

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We’re more likely to punish wrongdoing as a third party to a non-violent offense than when we’re victimized by it, according to a new study by New York University psychology researchers. The findings may offer insights into how juries differ from plaintiffs in seeking to restore justice.

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Amoebas aren’t the only cells that crawl: Movement is crucial to development, wound healing and immune response in animals, not to mention cancer metastasis. In two new studies from Johns Hopkins, researchers answer long-standing questions about how complex cells sense the chemical trails that show them where to go — and the role of cells’ internal “skeleton” in responding to those cues.

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Astronomers at Georgia State University’s Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy (CHARA) have observed the expanding thermonuclear fireball from a nova that erupted last year in the constellation Delphinus with unprecedented clarity.

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Using CRISPR, researchers at MIT's Koch Institute have developed a new approach to rapidly model the effects of tumor cells’ genetic mutations in mice.