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In a discovery that further demonstrates just how unexpected and unusual nature can be, scientists have found two strains of bacteria whose symbiotic relationship is unlike anything seen before.

Long, thin, hairlike Thioploca (meaning "sulfur braids" in Spanish) trichomes form chains down into marine sediment, which tiny anammox cells ride down like an elevator. At the bottom, the anammox cells consume the waste products of the Thioploca: nitrite and ammonium, or "fixed" nitrogen.

BETHESDA, MD -- The first study to sequence and analyze the entire genome of a HeLa cell line, along with access to its sequence data, has been published today (Wednesday, August 7) in its final version, by G3: Genes|Genomes|Genetics, an open-access, scientific journal of the Genetics Society of America.

The article, "The Genomic and Transcriptomic Landscape of a HeLa Cell Line," by Landry et al., was authored by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and was published in an early online version March 11, 2013.

One of the most basic and intensively studied processes in biology—one which has been detailed in biology textbooks for decades—has gained a new level of understanding, thanks to the application of simple math to a problem that scientists never before thought could benefit from mathematics.

Call it the Goldilocks Principle — animals can survive and reproduce only if the temperature is just right. Too hot and they will overheat. Too cold and they will freeze.

To stay in their comfort zone, animals have evolved very sensitive temperature sensors to detect the relatively narrow margin in which they can survive. Until recently, scientists knew little about how these sensors operated.

Life is not a walk in the park for the world's largest bacteria, that live as soft, noodle-like, white strings on the bottom of the ocean depths. Without being able to fend for themselves, they get invaded by parasitic microorganisms that steal the nutrition, that they have painstakingly retreived. This newly discovered bizarre deep ocean relationship may ultimately impact ocean productivity, report researchers from University of Southern Denmark now in the scientific journal Nature.

Ice ages and warm periods have alternated fairly regularly in the Earth's history: the Earth's climate cools roughly every 100,000 years, with vast areas of North America, Europe and Asia being buried under thick ice sheets. Eventually, the pendulum swings back: it gets warmer and the ice masses melt. While geologists and climate physicists found solid evidence of this 100,000-year cycle in glacial moraines, marine sediments and arctic ice, until now they were unable to find a plausible explanation for it.

Scientists have created a powerful micro-supercapacitor, just nanometres thick, that could help electronics companies develop mobile phones and cameras that are smaller, lighter and thinner than ever before. The tiny power supply measures less than half a centimetre across and is made from a flexible material, opening up the possibility for wearable electronics.

The research is published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Energy & Environmental Science.

EUGENE, Ore. -- (Aug. 7, 2013) – Although librarians adopted Internet technology quickly, they initially dismissed search engines, which duplicated tasks they considered integral to their field. Their eventual embrace of the technology required a reinvention of their occupational identity, according to a study by University of Oregon researchers.

An international team of researchers has described a new physical effect that could be used to develop more efficient magnetic chips for information processing. The quantum mechanical effect makes it easier to produce spin-polarized currents necessary for the switching of magnetically stored information. The research findings were published online on 28 July in the high-impact journal Nature Nanotechnology (DOI:10.1038/NNANO.2013.145).

Moderate exercise could be good for keeping your tendons healthy according to new research from the University of East Anglia funded by Arthritis Research UK.

The onset of tendon disease has previously been associated with exercise. However new research published today in the journal Molecular Cell Research shows that doing moderate exercise could help guard against and treat the painful and often debilitating condition.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 7—The applications of gene therapy and genetic engineering are broad: everything from pet fish that glow red to increased crop yields worldwide to cures for many of the diseases that plague humankind. But realizing them always starts with solving the same basic scientific question—how to "transfect" a cell by inserting foreign DNA into it.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Researchers have discovered a novel mechanism responsible for the loss of a critical tumor-suppressor gene in rhabdomyosarcoma and other soft-tissue sarcomas, rare cancers that strike mainly children and often respond poorly to treatment. Their cause is largely unknown.

Knowledge of the mechanism could guide the development of more effective therapies for these malignancies, say researchers who led the study at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James).

The Institute of Food Research (IFR) has been undertaking research for the Food Standards Agency to establish if the cooking technique sous vide is safe. Sous vide uses lower temperatures to improve food quality and could be a step closer to being more widely adopted after Institute of Food Research scientists assessed the steps needed to ensure the process is safe.

WASHINGTON — Cases involving children ingesting magnets quintupled between 2002 and 2011, with ingestion of multiple magnets generally resulting in more serious outcomes, including emergency surgery. The results of a study documenting a rapid rise in pediatric injuries was published online yesterday in Annals of Emergency Medicine ("Rise in Pediatric Magnet-Related Foreign Bodies Requiring Emergency Care").

One of the rare scientific reports on the rarest form of lightning -- ball lightning -- describes better ways of producing this mysterious phenomenon under the modern laboratory conditions needed to explain it. The new study on a phenomenon that puzzled and perplexed the likes of Aristotle 2,300 years ago and Nikola Tesla a century ago appears in ACS' The Journal of Physical Chemistry A.