Body

For many inherited diseases, such as cystic fibrosis or Huntington disease, the disease-causing genetic mutation damages or removes a protein that has an essential role in the body. This protein defect is the root cause of the disease symptoms.

An investigational malaria vaccine has been found to be safe, to generate an immune system response, and to offer protection against malaria infection in healthy adults, according to the results of an early-stage clinical trial published Aug. 8 in the journal Science.

URBANA, Ill. – The use of soybean meal in diets fed to weanling pigs is limited due to the presence of anti-nutritional factors that young pigs can't tolerate. Therefore, other sources of protein, such as fish meal and plasma, are used in nursery pig diets. But there are other ingredients available to producers as well. Researchers at the University of Illinois have determined the nutritional value of three new protein products that have recently become available as feed ingredients for pigs.

Modern proteins exhibit an impressive degree of structural diversity, which has been well characterized, but very little is known about how and when over the course of evolution 3D protein structures arose. In a study published by Cell Press August 8 in Structure, researchers resurrected 4-billion-year-old Precambrian proteins in the laboratory and gained novel insights into protein evolution by analyzing their X-ray crystal structures.

For children and immune compromised adults in developing countries, diarrheal disease induced by rotavirus can be life threatening. Current rotaviral vaccines are highly effective in the Western world, but are not as effective in developing countries. Additionally, these vaccines are not appropriate for use outside of a very narrow age window or in immune compromised individuals.

Cancer progression is aided by the ability of tumors to evade recognition by the immune system. In this issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Gerard Blobe and colleagues at Duke University identify a mechanism by which tumors evade detection. Using mouse models of breast cancer and melanoma, they show that loss of the Type III TGF-β receptor (TGFBR3) in tumors promotes cancer progression by altering signaling in tumor-associated immune cells.

India experienced a demographic transformation several thousand years ago, from a region in which mixture between highly different populations was common to one in which mixture even between closely related groups became rare. The finding, which will be published online on August 8, 2013 in the American Journal of Human Genetics, published by Cell Press, provides new information about the peopling of India and improves our understanding of the changes that led to the present-day structure of Indian populations.

Scientists from Harvard Medical School and the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology in Hyderabad, India, provide evidence that modern-day India is the result of recent population mixture among divergent demographic groups.

The findings, published August 8 in the American Journal of Human Genetics, describe how India transformed from a country where mixture between different populations was rampant to one where endogamy—that is, marrying within the local community and a key attribute of the caste system—became the norm.

KANSAS CITY, MO—A little-studied factor known as the Little Elongation Complex (LEC) plays a critical and previously unknown role in the transcription of small nuclear RNAs (snRNA), according to a new study led by scientists at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research and published in the Aug. 22, 2013, issue of the journal Molecular Cell.

Hidden in the tangled, repetitious folds of DNA structures called centromeres, researchers from Harvard Medical School and the Broad Institute have discovered the hiding place of 20 million base pairs of genetic sequence, finding a home for 10 percent of the DNA that is thought to be missing from the standard reference map of the human genome.

The current systems for the production of chemicals, fuels and materials heavily rely on the use of fossil resources. Due to the increasing concerns on climate change and other environmental problems, however, there has been much interest in developing biorefineries for the production of such chemicals, fuels and materials from renewable resources. For the biorefineries to be competitive with the traditional fossil resource-based refineries, development of high performance microorganisms is the most important as it will affect the overall economics of the process most significantly.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA and COLLEGE STATION, TX—August 8, 2013—An enzyme is a tiny, well-oiled machine. A class of proteins that are made up of multiple, interlocking molecular components, enzymes perform a variety of tasks inside each cell. However, precisely how these components work together to complete these tasks has long eluded scientists. But now, a team of researchers has found a way to map an enzyme's underlying molecular machinery, revealing patterns that could allow them to predict how an enzyme behaves—and what happens when this process disrupted.

In what is the biggest study of its kind to date, researchers from Technische Universität München (TUM) have identified over 10,000 different proteins in cancer cells. "Nearly all anti-tumor drugs are targeted against cellular proteins," says Prof. Bernhard Küster, Head of the TUM Chair of Proteomics and Bioanalytics. "Identifying the proteome the protein portfolio of tumor cells increases our chances of finding new targets for drugs."

Since 2011, the University of North Carolina has partnered with the government of Malawi to establish a pathology laboratory in the nation's capital, building on an existing decades-long collaboration. The laboratory has provided an invaluable service to patients and has also built capacity at a national teaching hospital, according to an analysis of the first 20 months of operation published (date) online by PLOS ONE.

CINCINNATI – New research posted online by the Nature journal Leukemia suggests blocking part of a DNA repair complex that helps some types of leukemia resist treatment can increase the effectiveness of chemotherapy and enhance survival.