Feature Channels: Biotech

• share
• favorite_border

Natural carbon dioxide production from deep subsurface soils contributes significantly to emissions, even in a semiarid floodplain.

• share
• favorite_border

Built using Apple’s ResearchKit, the Asthma Mobile Health Study demonstrates utility, security, and validity of smartphone-based research to engage broader patient population

• share
• favorite_border

A new study from the University of Chicago suggests that while proteins that control organ growth accumulate around the edges of cells, they actually function at a different cellular site.

• share
• favorite_border

Research from the University of Chicago has identified a new signaling system that epithelial cells use to coordinate their individual movements and efficiently move tissues.

• share
• favorite_border

Results of tests provide evidence that exposure to a chemical mixture can disturb thyroid hormone signalling. The authors say that this adds weight to the suggestion that similar exposures can adversely affect brain development in unborn children.

• share
• favorite_border

Regular, unleaded or algae? That's a choice drivers could make at the pump one day. But for algal biofuels to compete with petroleum, farming algae has to become less expensive. Toward that goal, Sandia National Laboratories is testing strains of algae for resistance to a host of predators and diseases, and learning to detect when an algae pond is about to crash. These experiments are part of the new, $6 million Development of Integrated Screening, Cultivar Optimization and Validation Research (DISCOVR) project, whose goal is to determine which algae strains are the toughest and most commercially viable.

• share
• favorite_border

Working as part of an international research consortium, a multidisciplinary team at The Johns Hopkins University has completed the design phase for a fully synthetic yeast genome.

• share
• favorite_border

OICR researchers, together with international collaborators, have invented a technique to avoid a major problem with common laboratory techniques and improve the sensitivity of important cancer tests. The findings, published today in the journal Nature Protocols, describe a process by which the sensitivity of DNA sequencing can be improved. The technology, called SiMSen-Seq, could aid in detecting the recurrence of cancers, catching possible disease relapses faster than current methods and improving patient outcomes.

• share
• favorite_border

New TSRI Study Points to Potential Strategy to Kill Cancer Cells

• share
• favorite_border

Baca determined the relationships of 53 species of Noteridae representing all subfamilies, tribes and 16 of 17 genera within the family. By sequencing and comparing DNA sequences, the team’s work has led to a “comprehensive phylogenetic reconstruction” of the evolutionary history of the aquatic beetles.

• share
• favorite_border

Proteins, those basic components of cells and tissues, carry out many biological functions by working with partners in networks. The dynamic nature of these networks – where proteins interact with different partners at different times and in different cellular environments – can present a challenge to scientists who study them.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at Thomas Jefferson University have shown that the composition of the mitochondrial calcium portal (the protein that regulates when and how much calcium enters) is different depending on the organ in the body, and this difference allows mitochondria to tune their energy output by decoding a pattern of amplitude and/or frequency of calcium oscillations inside a cell. The results, published March 7 in the journal Cell Reports, could shed light on our basic understanding of organ health and disease.

• share
• favorite_border

Using red blood cells modified to carry disease-specific antigens, scientists from Whitehead Institute and Boston Children’s Hospital have prevented and alleviated two autoimmune diseases—multiple sclerosis (MS) and type 1 diabetes—in early stage mouse models.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have discovered how a protein called α2δ4 establishes proper vision.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers discover the first CRISPR-Cas9 system in archaea, which may enable new technologies for biological research.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers from Columbia Engineering and Columbia University Medical Center have—for the first time—maintained a fully functional lung outside the body for several days. They designed the cross-circulation platform that maintained the viability and function of the donor lung and the stability of the recipient over 36-56 hours, used the advanced support system to fully recover the functionality of lungs injured by ischemia and made them suitable for transplant. (Nature Biomedical Engineering 3/6)

• share
• favorite_border

New findings Saint Louis University scientists suggest that drugs targeting a nuclear receptor may be able to lower LDL (bad) cholesterol in an animal model.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers from the UC Davis MIND Institute, University of North Carolina (UNC) and other institutions have found that altered distribution of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in high-risk infants can predict whether they will develop autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The study appears today in the journal Biological Psychiatry.

• share
• favorite_border

Scores of American chestnut seedlings growing in upstate New York are the vanguard in the restoration of what was once the most dominant tree in the eastern forests. The trees carry one gene, added by scientists, that makes them capable of withstanding the invasive blight that wiped out billions of their ancestors a century ago.

• share
• favorite_border

The Bagley College of Engineering at Mississippi State University has expanded its undergraduate degree offerings to include a new opportunity in biomedical engineering.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers have developed a new way to identify and sort stem cells that may one day allow clinicians to restore vision to people with damaged corneas using the patient’s own eye tissue.

• share
• favorite_border

The most complex crystal designed and built from nanoparticles has been reported by researchers at Northwestern University and the University of Michigan. The work demonstrates that some of nature’s most complicated structures can be deliberately assembled if researchers can control the shapes of the particles and the way they connect using DNA. Potential applications of the cage-like structures, called clathrates, include controlling light, capturing pollutants and delivering therapeutics. New types of lenses, lasers and even Star Trek-like cloaking materials are possible.

• share
• favorite_border

Images of our faces exist in numerous important databases - driver's license, passport, law enforcement, employment - all to accurately identify us. But can these images continue to identify us as we age? Michigan State University biometrics expert Anil Jain and team set out to investigate what extent facial aging affects the performance of automatic facial recognition systems and what implications it could have on successfully identifying criminals or determining when identification documents need to be renewed.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at the University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Medicine have discovered a new potential strategy to personalize therapy for brain and blood cancers.

• share
• favorite_border

Some fruit flies build up tolerance to the toxin α-amanitin; the genetic mechanisms behind this adaptation link to an important metabolic pathway. A team from Michigan Technological University used genome-wide association mapping to draw the connections for 180 fruit fly lines.

• share
• favorite_border

The regenerative biology team at the Morgridge Institute for Research, led by stem cell pioneer and University of Wisconsin-Madison Professor James Thomson, is studying whether stem cell differentiation rates can be accelerated in the lab and made available to patients faster.

• share
• favorite_border

A team of researchers led by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute will examine the link between zinc deficiency, Hedgehog, and prostate cancer in a new study funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at Rutgers and other universities have created a new way to identify the state and fate of stem cells earlier than previously possible. Understanding a stem cell’s fate – the type of cell it will eventually become – and how far along it is in the process of development can help scientists better manipulate cells for stem cell therapy.

• share
• favorite_border

Understanding how brown rot fungi degrade wood could lead to new tools for more efficient biofuel production.

• share
• favorite_border

The American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) recently signed an agreement officially lending its support to the national March for Science rally and teach-in in Washington, DC, scheduled for Earth Day, Saturday, April 22. ASCB was among the first to uphold the event’s mission to “unite the diverse universe of scientists and other community members in a non-partisan manner.”

• share
• favorite_border

The George Washington University and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will hold a workshop, “High-Throughput Sequencing Computational Standards for Regulatory Sciences,” March 16-17, 2017 in Bethesda, Maryland.

• share
• favorite_border

If we know what causes Duchenne, why do promising treatments consistently fail? UVA launches innovative new effort to find out.

• share
• favorite_border

Since 2012, research teams in the Qualcomm Tricorder Xprize competition have vied to create a mobile diagnostic device modeled after the fictional medical tricorder from Star Trek. For the first time, competition finalist Chung-Kang Peng, PhD, will present data on his team’s tricorder prototype in a special session at the 69th AACC Annual Scientific Meeting & Clinical Lab Expo in San Diego.

• share
• favorite_border

/PRNewswire/ -- Science Exchange and Eurofins are excited to announce that Eurofins Central Laboratory is now a service provider listed on the Science Exchange marketplace for outsourced research services. This means that pharmaceutical and biotech companies around the world now have faster access to Eurofins's Clinical Testing portfolio, as well as its end-to-end analytical testing solutions from Drug Discovery to Product Testing.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at Vanderbilt University have created a three-dimensional organ-on-a-chip that can mimic the heart’s amazing biomechanical properties in order to study cardiac disease, determine the effects that different drugs have on the heart and screen for new drugs to treat heart ailments.

• share
• favorite_border

Chemist Nathan C. Gianneschi, whose interdisciplinary research has the potential to make a significant impact in human health, will join the Northwestern University faculty, effective July 1, the University announced today. Gianneschi, a Northwestern alumnus, has developed new methods for creating nanomaterials that can sense and respond to biological signals.

• share
• favorite_border

The Institute for Biomedical Sciences (IBMS) at Georgia State University is offering two new graduate degree programs designed to prepare students for careers in the biomedical sciences that will enhance human health and bring scientific discoveries to market.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers in bioengineering will join a consortium of academia, industry and government organizations and the nonprofit sector to develop next-generation manufacturing processes and technologies for cells, tissues and organs.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers at The University of Kansas Cancer Center are collaborating on the “lab-on-a-chip,” a testing platform that captures and performs analysis of various biomarkers, which are actively released by tumor cells into blood. Rather than the usual invasive and costly biopsy, the credit-card size devices will screen for circulating markers that are released from cancer cells within patients’ blood.

• share
• favorite_border

With an eye on tiny ticks and mosquitoes, a Clarkson biology professor has created an undergrad parasitology course embraced by professionals in the field as well as by students, showing a glimpse of the future of biology education.

• share
• favorite_border

An international collaboration of life scientists, including experts at Van Andel Research Institute, has described in exquisite detail the critical first steps of DNA replication, which allows cells to divide and most advanced life, including human, to propagate.

• share
• favorite_border

A tiny snail may offer an alternative to opioids for pain relief. Scientists at the University of Utah have found a compound that blocks pain by targeting a pathway not associated with opioids. Research in rodents indicates that the benefits continue long after the compound have cleared the body.

• share
• favorite_border

For the first time, scientists analyzed the genetic material of surface microbes that are colonizing the deep subsurface, where they are adapting and thriving.

• share
• favorite_border

Powerful new computational methods now enable scientists to design a virtually unlimited variety of hyperstable peptide structures not found in nature. This research opens a new frontier in drug discovery.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers developing technologies to improve therapeutic success among radiotherapy patients, prevent chest wall collapses in pre-term infants with respiratory distress, and assist surgeons with pre-operative planning for femur fracture alignments will receive a total of $600,000 in funding through the ninth round of the University City Science Center’s QED Proof-of-Concept Program.

• share
• favorite_border

The community of microorganisms that resides in the gut, known as the microbiome, has been shown to work in tandem with the genes of a host organism to regulate insulin secretion, a key variable in the onset of the metabolic disease diabetes. That is the primary finding of a study published this week by a team led by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers.

• share
• favorite_border

The public’s wariness with new technologies, like CRISPR-9 and gene editing, is largely based on ethical, religious and social concerns, rather than concerns about safety or efficacy, which is what regulatory agencies are limited to consider.

• share
• favorite_border

Luis Martinez, Ph.D., is an infectious disease researcher selected as a Fellow in the second cohort of the AAAS Alan I. Leshner Leadership Institute for Public Engagement with Science.

• share
• favorite_border

Michigan State University’s Anil Jain adapted his human facial recognition system to create LemurFaceID, the first computer facial recognition system for lemurs. Once optimized, LemurFaceID can assist with long-term research of the endangered species.

• share
• favorite_border

The ability of small intestine cells to absorb nutrients and act as a barrier to pathogens is “significantly decreased” after chronic exposure to nanoparticles of titanium dioxide, a common food additive found in everything from chewing gum to bread, according to research from Binghamton University