Right now, it looks a little like one of those plastic containers you might fill with gasoline when your car has run dry. But Scott Gallager is not headed to the nearest Mobil station. The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) biologist has other, grander plans for his revolutionary Swimming Behavioral Spectrophotometer (SBS), which employs one-celled protozoa to detect toxins in water sources.
Not only is he working on streamlining the boxy-looking contraption—eventually even evolving it into a computer chip—but he sees it as a tool to potentially “monitor all the drinking water in the world.
Yale University researchers have found that a single molecule not only connects brain cells but also changes how we learn. The findings, reported in the December 9 issue of the journal Neuron, may help researchers discover ways to improve memory and could lead to new therapies to correct neurological disorders.
The junctions between brain cells over which nerve pulses pass — called synapses — are crucial for regulating learning and memory and how we think. Aberrations in the structure and function of synapses have been linked to mental retardation and autism, while synapses are lost in the aging brains of Alzheimer’s patients. (more…)
ANN ARBOR, Mich.— Under just the right conditions — which involve an ultra-high-intensity laser beam and a two-mile-long particle accelerator — it could be possible to create something out of nothing, according to University of Michigan researchers.
The scientists and engineers have developed new equations that show how a high-energy electron beam combined with an intense laser pulse could rip apart a vacuum into its fundamental matter and antimatter components, and set off a cascade of events that generates additional pairs of particles and antiparticles. (more…)
The ability to tolerate aggression is partly genetic, UCLA life scientists report in the first study to demonstrate a genetic component to a social network trait in a non-human population.
“The ability to tolerate aggression is passed on across generations; there is genetic variation in the ability to tolerate aggression,” said the study co-author Daniel T. Blumstein, professor and chair of ecology and evolutionary biology at UCLA.
Blumstein, a leader in the field of applying social network statistics to animals, and his colleagues studied four groups of yellow-bellied marmots, which are related to squirrels, over six years in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. Each group included 15 to 30 marmots.(more…)
Aspirin - to fight cancer. Image credit: Volker Mintzlaff
Or does it? Fresh research from Oxford University seems to reveal that a low dose of aspirin taken over a substantial period of time produces promising results, indicating that the death rates of many types of cancer reduce greatly. In fact, the evidence presented is staggering and if true, would be a medical breakthrough of exponential proportions.
Let us be optimistic, for cancer is a disease which has cut across most families around the globe. Few of us have not lost a grandparent, parent, uncle or aunt to this disease, in some cases even brothers, or worse still, nephews or nieces…or worse still, sons or daughters, grandsons and daughters. Now it seems there is good news which does not involve chemo-therapy or radio-therapy, which create many success stories but also many victims. (more…)
It may take years before scientists determine the full impact of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. But, utilizing the human-occupied submersible Alvin and the autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) Sentry, researchers are about to investigate—and view first-hand—the possible effects of the spill at the bottom of the Gulf.
And, from Dec. 6-14, the mission will be relayed to the public as it happens on the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s (WHOI) Dive and Discover website (https://divediscover.whoi.edu). (more…)
COLUMBIA, Mo. – Parents are often amazed at how fast their child grows and develops. New research at the University of Missouri has determined that the ability to quantify – even things that are hard to quantify, such as liquid – may develop much sooner than most parents realize.
University of Missouri researcher Kristy vanMarle, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychological Sciences in the College of Arts and Science, has determined that contrary to what previous studies have shown, infants are able to quantify non-cohesive substances – like sand, water, or even Cheerios – as early as 10 months. As long as the difference between the two substances is large enough, vanMarle has found that infants will choose the larger amount, especially when it comes to food. (more…)
Dr. Owen Witte, director of the Broad Stem Cell Research Center at UCLA and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator. Image credit: University of California
A protein that is crucial for regulating the self-renewal of normal prostate stem cells, which are needed to repair injured cells or restore normal cells killed by hormone-withdrawal therapy for cancer, also aids the transformation of healthy cells into prostate cancer cells, researchers at UCLA have found.
The findings, by scientists with the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA, may have important implications for controlling cancer growth and progression.
Results from the three-year study, done in primary cells and in animal models, were published Dec. 2 in the early online edition of the peer-reviewed journal Cell Stem Cell.
The protein, called Bmi-1, is often up-regulated, or turned on, in prostate cancer. It has been associated with higher-grade cancers and is predictive of poor prognosis, according to previous studies. However, its functional roles in prostate stem cell maintenance and prostate cancer have been unclear, said the study’s senior author, Dr. Owen Witte, director of the Broad Stem Cell Research Center and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator.(more…)
