Researchers have identified a molecular link between thermogenesis and the development of inflammation in fat cells. Activating molecular switch in white fat cells enabled mice to eat a high-calorie diet without becoming obese or developing the inflammation that causes insulin resistance, report Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists.
Whitehead Institute researchers have determined the mechanism used by c-Myc to increase the expression of all active genes in cancer cells. Elevated levels of c-Myc are linked to increased rates of metastasis, disease recurrence, and mortality in cancer patients. Guided by this new model, researchers hope to find ways to restrict c-Myc’s activity to eradicate cancer cells that become dependent on c-Myc for their survival.
Scientists at Joslin Diabetes Center have identified a new factor — microRNA processing in fat tissue — which plays a major role in aging and stress resistance. This finding may lead to the development of treatments that increase stress resistance and longevity and improve metabolism.
A research team led by investigators at New York University and NYU School of Medicine has determined how cells that cause inflammatory ailments, such as Crohn’s disease, multiple sclerosis, and arthritis, differentiate from stem cells and ultimately affect the clinical outcome of these diseases.
Biologists at New York University have uncovered one way that biological clocks control neuronal activity—a discovery that sheds new light on sleep-wake cycles and offers potential new directions for research into therapies to address sleep disorders and jetlag.
Based on two new studies by researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, regeneration of a new limb or organ in a human will be much more difficult than the mad scientist and supervillain, Dr. Curt Connors, made it seem in the Amazing Spider-man comics and films.
Researchers have discovered a molecule that may be capable of delivering drugs inside the body to treat diseases.
New research shows that a special population of stem cells found in cord blood has the innate ability to migrate to the intestine and contribute to the cell population there, suggesting the cells’ potential to treat inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
Salk scientists have identified a unique molecular signature in induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), "reprogrammed" cells that show great promise in regenerative medicine thanks to their ability to generate a range of body tissues.
Biologists and informaticists at Indiana University have produced one of the most extensive pictures ever of mutation processes in the DNA sequence of an organism, elucidating important new evolutionary information about the molecular nature of mutations and how fast those heritable changes occur.
Scientists generally think that reduced insulin production by the pancreas, a hallmark of type 2 diabetes, is due to the death of the organ’s beta cells. However, a new study by Columbia University Medical Center researchers shows that beta cells do not die but instead revert to a more fundamental, undifferentiated cell type. The findings suggest that strategies to prevent beta cells from de-differentiating, or to coax them to re-differentiate, might improve glucose balance in patients with type 2 diabetes. The study, conducted in mice was published today in the online edition of the journal Cell.
New genetic markers identified by researchers at Whitehead Institute and MIT could help make the process for reprogramming regular body cells into pluripotent stem cells more efficient, allowing scientists to predict which treated cells will successfully become pluripotent.
A new Johns Hopkins study has unraveled the changes in a key cardiac protein that can lead to heart muscle malfunction and precipitate heart failure.
In a study using zebrafish, University of North Carolina School of Medicine researchers reveal how microbes in the intestine aid the uptake of fats — and suggest how diet may influence our bodies’ microbial communities.
Cells surf through a microfluidic chip on fluid streamlines created by an oscillating plate.
The invasion of cancer cells into the lymph vessels that connect the breast to surrounding lymph nodes is the first step leading to the metastasis, or spread, of cancer throughout the body. Metastasis is the primary cause of breast cancer deaths. Surprisingly little is known about the control of this process and how it might be interrupted to prolong the lives of women with breast cancer. In a study to be reported Sept. 10 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Online Early Edition, researchers at Johns Hopkins describe their discovery of how a protein responsible for cell survival in low oxygen can trigger the spread of cancer cells into the lymphatic system in a mouse model of breast cancer.
Researchers from the University of Utah report that a cell-to-cell communication network known as the Wnt signaling pathway plays an important role in both the production and specialization of nerve cell precursors in the hypothalamus.
Towards a better understanding of how tissue stiffness drives cancer, researchers show that epithelial cells lining the intestine of zebrafish with a mutation of the smooth muscle myosin gene form protrusions called invadopodia that allow the cells to invade surrounding tissue. The protrusions form in response to contractions in surrounding smooth muscle cells.
A protein called “clathrin,” which is found in every human cell and plays a critical role in transporting materials within them, also plays a key role in cell division, according to new research at the University of California, San Francisco.
UCLA stem cell scientists have shown that two common tumor suppressor genes, TSC and PTEN, are vital to regulating the stem cell-like precursor cells that create the blood supply in Drosophila, the common fruit fly.
A high-fat diet triggers chemical reactions in female mice that could explain why women are more likely than men to gain fat in the abdomen after eating excess saturated fat, new research suggests. The study also sheds light on why women gain fat following menopause.
A study led by researchers at the UC San Diego Stem Cell Research program and funded by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) looks at an important RNA binding protein called LIN28, which is implicated in pluripotency and reprogramming as well as in cancer and other diseases.
Mass spectrometry protein assays that match sensitivity and accuracy of antibody-based clinical tests might speed drug discovery, basic biology research.
Florida State University researchers led by physics doctoral student Campion Loong have achieved significant benchmarks in a study of the human cardiac protein alpha-tropomyosin, which is an essential, molecular-level component that controls the heart’s contraction on every beat. Using an imaging method called atomic force microscopy, Loong achieved two “firsts”: the first direct imaging of individual alpha-tropomyosin molecules and the first demonstrated examples of a measure of the human cardiac protein’s flexibility.
Salk findings of a key genetic mechanism in plant hormone signaling may help save crops from stress and help address human hunger.
Open an undergraduate biochemistry textbook and you will learn that enzymes are highly efficient and specific in catalyzing chemical reactions in living organisms, and that they evolved to this state from their “sloppy” and “promiscuous” ancestors to allow cells to grow more efficiently. This fundamental paradigm is being challenged in a new study by bioengineers at the University of California, San Diego, who reported in the journal Science what a few enzymologists have suspected for years: many enzymes are still pretty sloppy and promiscuous, catalyzing multiple chemical reactions in living cells, for reasons that were previously not well understood.
Columbia University Medical Center researchers have identified a potential medical treatment for the cognitive effects of stress-related disorders, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The study, conducted in a PTSD mouse model, shows that an experimental drug called S107, one of a new class of small-molecule compounds called Rycals, prevented learning and memory deficits associated with stress-related disorders. The findings were published today in the online edition of Cell.
Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have discovered a new “first response” mechanism that the immune system uses to respond to infection. The findings challenge the current understanding of immunity and could lead to new strategies for boosting effectiveness of all vaccines. The study, conducted in mice, published online today in the journal Immunity.
Stowers investigators define factors that regulate size of cellular fat pools.
A drug originally developed to stop cancerous tumors may hold the potential to prevent abnormal brain cell growth and learning disabilities in some children, if they can be diagnosed early enough, a new animal study suggests.
By examining the results of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) in conjunction with experiments on mouse and human red blood cells, researchers in the lab of Whitehead Institute Founding Member Harvey Lodish have identified the protein cyclin D3 as regulating the number of cell divisions RBC progenitors undergo, which ultimately affects the resulting size and quantity of RBCs.
Pathogens can slip through leaf pores and begin infecting a plant. However, University of Delaware research shows that this invasion is halted when a beneficial bacterium is present in the soil where the plant is rooted.
Some RNA molecules spend time in a restful state akin to hibernation rather than automatically carrying out their established job of delivering protein-building instructions in cells. Protein production in cells is not as clear-cut as biology textbooks suggest, scientists say.
Researchers show how repressor proteins ensure accurate gene expression by thwarting histone exchange.
Squishy models are anything but child’s play as they help researchers understand the building-block nature of proteins.
Scientists at North Carolina State University have discovered a phenomenon never seen before in plants while studying molecular changes inside tree cells as wood is formed.
Johns Hopkins scientists have developed a reliable method to turn the clock back on blood cells, restoring them to a primitive stem cell state from which they can then develop into any other type of cell in the body.
Stowers scientists manipulate the Set2 pathway to show how genes are faithfully copied.
Skeletal muscle degeneration in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is worsened by stiffening of the microtubule cytoskeleton that provide structure inside muscle cells.
Research on a unique vertebrate called the sea lamprey shows that more than a thousand genes are shed during its early development and “sealed’ into a compartment so they cannot be misexpressed and create untoward problems. The study was done at Benaroya Research Institute at Virginia Mason.
In a finding that could be important to the use of all kinds of stem cells in treating disease, scientists have discovered the crucial role of a protein called Mof in preserving the ‘stem-ness’ of stem cells, and priming them to become specialized cells in mice.
An international team of scientists led by Gregg Adams at the University of Saskatchewan has discovered that a protein in semen acts on the female brain to prompt ovulation, and is the same molecule that regulates the growth, maintenance, and survival of nerve cells.
A new study by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute shows a small molecule compound can generate reversible birth control in male mice.
Poxviruses, which are responsible for smallpox and other diseases, can adapt to defeat different host antiviral defenses by quickly and temporarily producing multiple copies of a gene that helps the viruses to counter host immunity.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard scientists have identified a new class of genes, dubbed CYCLOPS, that may serve as an Achilles' heel for many forms of cancer.
Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center and colleagues at the University of South Florida have discovered a mechanism that explains how some cancer cells “hijack” a biological process to potentially activate cell growth and the survival of cancer gene expression.
Researchers at the University of Iowa have identified a key protein that causes muscles to atrophy. The protein, Gadd45a, is responsible for 40 percent of the gene activity associated with muscle deterioration. The finding opens the door to therapies to block Gadd45a and thus to deter muscle atrophy. Results appear in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.
A faulty gene linked to a rare blood vessel disorder has led investigators to discover a mechanism involved in determining the fate of possibly thousands of proteins working inside cells.
Researchers at Oregon State University have discovered, for the first time in any animal species, a type of “selfish” mitochondrial DNA that is actually hurting the organism and lessening its chance to survive – and bears a strong similarity to some damage done to human cells as they age. It could provide an important new model to study human aging.
Experimenting with human prostate cancer cells and mice, cancer imaging experts at Johns Hopkins say they have developed a method for finding and killing malignant cells while sparing healthy ones.
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