Body

To protect us from disease our immune system employs macrophages, cells that roam our body in search of disease-causing bacteria. With the help of long tentacle-like protrusions, macrophages can catch suspicious particles, pull them towards their cell bodies, internalise and destroy them.

Contrary to textbook models, many genes that should be 'off' in embryonic stem cells and specialized adult cells remain primed to produce master regulatory proteins, leaving those cells vulnerable to identity changes

Biologists have long thought that a simple on/off switch controls most genes in human cells. Flip the switch and a cell starts or stops producing a particular protein. But new evidence suggests that this model is too simple and that our genes are more ready for action than previously thought.

Opinions people have about innovations are influenced by the context in which they form their opinion. For example, opinions about a novel energy source like biomass are influenced by thoughts regarding other energy sources.

The less knowledge, interest or time people have, the stronger this effect. Sustainable energy options must therefore be promoted in the right context says Dutch researcher Wouter van den Hoogen.

Dr. Éric A. Cohen, Director of the Human Retrovirology Research Unit at Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal, and his team have published a discovery that could lead to the development of a new class of drugs to combat HIV.

When a strand of DNA breaks in the body's cells, it normally does not take long until it has been repaired. Now researchers at the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet have discovered a new mechanism that helps to explain how the cell performs these repairs.

Chitin and Chitosan have been extracted from lobster waste and used in medicine and biomedicine by a team from the University of Havana. These researchers’ work has led to the development of a procedure to obtain surgical materials with great healing and antiseptic properties.

Chitin is a polymer very common in nature as part of animals’ and plants’ physical structures. Only cellulose is more abundant than chitin, which makes this compound a highly important renewable resource that can easily be found in arthropods, insects, arachnids, molluscs, fungus and algae.

For the first time, it can now be shown what enzyme copies the genetic make-up of cells. The discovery is being published in the journal Science by researchers at Umeå University in Sweden in collaboration with a team in the U.S. led by Thomas A. Kunkel.

The human genome has already been mapped, as have the genomes of several other organisms. On the other hand, little has been known how genes are copied and repaired so efficiently and precisely.

Researchers at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering have uncovered a missing link in scientists' understanding of the physical forces that give DNA its famous double helix shape.

One of the major issues associated with longer life expectancy in man and his best friend is an increase in the incidence of cancer.

Dr Ali Mobasheri, an Associate Professor from the School of Veterinary Medicine and Science at The University of Nottingham, says that studying tumors in dogs and humans could give us a better understanding of their shared pathogenesis.

A semiconductor membrane designed by researchers at the University of Illinois could offer more flexibility and better electrical performance than biological membranes. Built from thin silicon layers doped with different impurities, the solid-state membrane also could be used in applications such as single-molecule detection, protein filtering and DNA sequencing.

Current strict environmental legislation demands advanced concepts to reduce the emission of harmful gasses by cars. Reducing the emission of nitrous oxides (NOx) emitted by diesel and lean-burn petrol engines is one of the challenges faced.

These economical engines produce exhaust fumes that are particularly rich in oxygen and therefore the conventional three-way catalytic converter is not suitable for converting the generated NOx into nitrogen. The current trend is therefore to add specific components such as barium to the catalytic converter to store the NOx formed.

Scientists have only recently begun to speculate that what’s referred to as “junk” DNA – the 96 percent of the human genome that doesn’t encode for proteins and previously seemed to have no useful purpose – is present in the genome for an important reason. But it wasn’t clear what the reason was. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego have discovered one important function of so-called junk DNA.

An international team of researchers has documented a remarkable example of natural selection in a tropical butterfly species that fought back - genetically speaking - against a highly invasive, male-killing bacteria.

In their study,A first-principles model of early evolution: Emergence of gene families, species, and preferred protein folds, Shakhnovich et al present a new model of early biological evolution – the first that directly relates the fitness of a population of evolving model organisms to the properties of their proteins.

Using plastics to harvest the energy of the sun just got a significant boost in efficiency thanks to a discovery made at the Center for Polymers and Organic Solids at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Nobel laureate Alan Heeger, professor of physics at UC Santa Barbara, worked with Kwanghee Lee of Korea and a team of other scientists to create a new “tandem” organic solar cell with increased efficiency. The discovery marks a step forward in materials science.