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Earthquakes, Glue and Grappling Hooks: Scientists Dissect the Movement of Bacteria

By Guest PostFebruary 15, 2013Scienceanti infective, avalanche motions, california nanosystems institute, combat harmful microbes, combat microbial pathogenesis, earthquakes, frequency, fruiting body, gerard wong, glide along surface, glue, grappling hooks, henry samueli school, human tissue, intensity, karin a dahmen, max gibiansky, microscopic bacteria, molecular glue, molecular mechanism, movement of bacteria, myxococcus xanthus, pathogenic bacteria, social structures, tectonic plates, tectonic plates move, therapeutic strategies, ucla, university of Illinois, urbana-champaign, wei hu, wenyuan shi

A team led by researchers from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science has discovered that microscopic bacteria have a lot in common with earthquakes — when it comes to their jolting movements.

In a new study published in the peer-reviewed Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists also report that a molecular “glue” produced by the bacteria to help them adhere to surfaces also acts as a sort of transportation lubricant, helping them move and organize into rudimentary social structures. These discoveries, they say, could lead to new ways to combat harmful microbes in the long term. (more…)

New Key to Organism Complexity Identified

By Guest PostJanuary 26, 2013Scienceangstroms, animal kingdom, berkeley lab, caenorhabditis elegans, california, canonical, critical transcription factors, cryo electron microscopy, dna binding proteins, dna promoter, drosophila, eva nogales, fruit fly, gene expression, gene pool, genome, george kassavetis, humans, james kadonaga, jie fang, level of gene, lobe a, macromolecular complex, mice, michael cianfrocco, model, molecular mechanism, organism, patricia grob, protein coding genes, rearranged, rna, single substructural element, species, split personality, structural states, tamar juven gershon, tfiid, transcription factors, university

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…)

Why Some Pain Drugs Become Less Effective Over Time

By Guest PostApril 22, 2012Healthdpdpe, graciela pineyro, journey, ligands, molecular mechanism, neural cell, opioid analgesics, opioid pain drugs, painkilling function, poppy plant, receptor recycling, sainte justine hospital, snc 80 t, university of montreal

Researchers at the University of Montreal’s Sainte-Justine Hospital have identified how neural cells are able to build up resistance to opioid pain drugs within hours. “A better understanding of these mechanisms will enable us to design drugs that avoid body resistance to these drugs and produce longer therapeutic responses, including longer-acting opioid analgesics”, lead author Dr. Graciela Pineyro said.

Humans have known about the usefulness of opioids, which are often harvested from poppy plants, for centuries, but we have very little insight into how they lose their effectiveness in the hours, days and weeks following the first dose. “Our study revealed cellular and molecular mechanisms within our bodies that enable us to develop resistance to this medication, or what scientists call drug tolerance,” she added. (more…)

Seed Size is Controlled by Maternally Produced Small Rnas, Scientists Find

By Guest PostApril 14, 2012Naturearabidopsis, austin, david baulcombe, diploid, double fertilization, duplicate genome, embryo, endosperm, flowering plant, gene, maternal genome, molecular mechanism, placenta, plant, plant embryo, plant evolution, rna molecule, seed, seed production, sirnas, small, small interfering rnas, tetraploid, university of cambridge, university of texas, z jeff chen

AUSTIN, Texas — Seed size is controlled by small RNA molecules inherited from a plant’s mother, a discovery from scientists at The University of Texas at Austin that has implications for agriculture and understanding plant evolution.

“Crop seeds provide nearly 70 to 80 percent of calories and 60 to 70 percent of all proteins consumed by the human population,” said Z. Jeff Chen, the D.J. Sibley Centennial Professor in Plant Molecular Genetics at The University of Texas at Austin. “Seed production is obviously very important for agriculture and plant evolution.” (more…)

Slow Snails, Fast Genes: Predatory Snails Refine Venoms Through Continuous Gene Duplication

By Guest PostApril 3, 2012Natureamerican samoa, cone snail, conotoxins, dan chang, DNA, gene, gene family, genus conus, hawaii, marine, molecular mechanism, neurotoxin, olfactory genes, panama, scorpion, snake, thomas duda, tropical, venoms

ANN ARBOR, Mich.— When tropical marine cone snails sink their harpoon-like teeth into their prey, they inject paralyzing venoms made from a potent mix of more than 100 different neurotoxins.

Biologists have known for more than a decade that the genes which provide the recipes for cone snail toxins are among the fastest-evolving genes in the animal kingdom, enabling these predatory gastropods to constantly refine their venoms to more precisely target the neuromuscular systems of their prey. (more…)

Physicist Detects Movement of Macromolecules Engineered into Our Food

By Guest PostSeptember 24, 2011Sciencecry toxins, molecular mechanism, movement of macromolecules, paul f cranefield award, planar lipid bilayer, pore-forming toxins, rikard blunck, thuringiensis, toxin proteins, university of montreal

Toxin proteins are genetically engineered into our food because they kill insects by perforating body cell walls, and Professor Rikard Blunck of the University of Montreal’s Group for the study of membrane proteins (GÉPROM) has detected the molecular mechanism involved. In recognition of his breakthrough, he received the Traditional Paul F. Cranefield Award of the Society of General Physiologists yesterday evening. “This study is about gaining a better understanding of the basic functioning of the toxin proteins in order to judge the risks of using them as pesticides for our nutrition,” Dr. Blunck explained. (more…)

Why Coffee Protects Against Diabetes

By Guest PostJanuary 13, 2011Health, Scienceamerican diabetes association, biological activity, body, brian chen, cancer, cardiovascular disease, coffee, coffee consumption, david geffen, decaffeinated coffee, diabetes, estrogen, gene, julie buring, molecular mechanism, morning elixir, mutation, non coffee drinkers, plasma levels, protective effect, protein, sex hormone binding globulin, sex hormones, shbg, simin liu, testosterone, tolerance to insulin, type 2 diabetes

*Researchers discover molecular mechanism behind drink’s prophylactic effect*

Coffee, that morning elixir, may give us an early jump-start to the day, but numerous studies have shown that it also may be protective against type 2 diabetes. Yet no one has really understood why.

Now, researchers at UCLA have discovered a possible molecular mechanism behind coffee’s protective effect. A protein called sex hormone–binding globulin (SHBG) regulates the biological activity of the body’s sex hormones, testosterone and estrogen, which have long been thought to play a role in the development of type 2 diabetes. And coffee consumption, it turns out, increases plasma levels of SHBG. (more…)

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