Physicists at Yale University have taken another significant step in the development of quantum computing, a new frontier in computing that promises exponentially faster information processing than the most sophisticated computers of today.
In research published online this month in the journal Nature, the Yale physicists demonstrate the most basic form of quantum error correction — a way to compensate for quantum computing’s intrinsic susceptibility to errors. Developing technology to correct these errors on the fly is a necessary step for fully realizing quantum computers. (more…)
*RNA editing is a key step in gene expression. Scientists at Brown University report in Nature Methods that they have engineered a gene capable of visually displaying the activity of the key enzyme ADAR in living fruit flies.*
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — To track what they can’t see, pilots look to the green glow of the radar screen. Now biologists monitoring gene expression, individual variation, and disease have a glowing green indicator of their own: Brown University biologists have developed a “radar” for tracking ADAR, a crucial enzyme for editing RNA in the nervous system.
The advance gives scientists a way to view when and where ADAR is active in a living animal and how much of it is operating. In experiments in fruit flies described in the journal Nature Methods, the researchers show surprising degrees of individual variation in ADAR’s RNA editing activity in the learning and memory centers of the brains of individual flies. (more…)
