AUSTIN, Texas — Neuroscientists at The University of Texas at Austin have generated mutant worms that do not get intoxicated by alcohol, a result that could lead to new drugs to treat the symptoms of people going through alcohol withdrawal.
The scientists accomplished this feat by inserting a modified human alcohol target into the worms, as reported this week in The Journal of Neuroscience. (more…)
Göttinger Max-Planck-Forscher entdecken wichtigen moleularen Schalter, der das Tier von Wachsein auf “Schlaf” programmiert
Warum schlafen Menschen und auch viele Tiere? Unser Wissen ist noch immer lückenhaft, wenn es um den Ursprung und die Funktion des Schlafes geht. Doch so viel ist klar: Alle Lebewesen, die über ein Nervensystem verfügen, müssen schlafen, um zu überleben. Dies gilt auch für den Fadenwurm Caenorhabditis elegans. Forscher um Henrik Bringmann vom Max-Planck-Institut für biophysikalische Chemie haben jetzt einen Faktor entdeckt, der die Fadenwurm-Larve vom wachen in einen schlafähnlichen Zustand versetzt. Da auch in Wirbeltieren ähnliche Mechanismen wirksam sind, könnten die Forschungsergebnisse zu wichtigen neuen Erkenntnissen in der Schlafforschung führen. (Current Biology, 29. Oktober 2013) (more…)
To safely use bacteria in agriculture to help fertilize crops, it is vital to understand the difference between harmful and healthy strains. The bacterial genus Burkholderia, for example, includes dangerous disease-causing pathogens — one species has even been listed as a potential bioterrorist agent — but also many species that are safe and important for plant development.
Can the microbial good and evil be told apart? Yes, UCLA life scientists and an international team of researchers report Jan. 8 in the online journal PLOS ONE. (more…)
Berkeley Scientists Find that a Critical Transcription Factor Co-exists in Two Distinct States
The enormously diverse complexity seen amongst individual species within the animal kingdom evolved from a surprisingly small gene pool. For example, mice effectively serve as medical research models because humans and mice share 80-percent of the same protein-coding genes. The key to morphological and behavioral complexity, a growing body of scientific evidence suggests, is the regulation of gene expression by a family of DNA-binding proteins called “transcription factors.” Now, a team of researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California (UC) Berkeley has discovered the secret behind how one these critical transcription factors is able to perform – a split personality. (more…)
Minuscule amounts of ethanol, the type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages, can more than double the life span of a tiny worm known as Caenorhabditis elegans, which is used frequently as a model in aging studies, UCLA biochemists report. The scientists said they find their discovery difficult to explain.
“This finding floored us — it’s shocking,” said Steven Clarke, a UCLA professor of chemistry and biochemistry and the senior author of the study, published Jan. 18 in the online journal PLoS ONE, a publication of the Public Library of Science. (more…)
