Scientists of the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine of the University of Luxembourg have developed a method for analysing the genome of cancer cells more precisely than ever before. The team led by Prof. Antonio del Sol, head of the research group Computational Biology, is employing bioinformatics: Using novel computing processes, the researchers have created models of the genome of cancer cells based on known changes to the genome. These models are useful for determining the structure of DNA in tumours.
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FORT COLLINS, Colo., Oct. 30, 2015 - Across Africa, lion populations are threatened by continued reductions in their range and associated genetic isolation.
Reproductive factors in women, such as a later starting age of menstruation, having children, breastfeeding and use of oral contraceptives, are associated with a reduced risk of death, according to research published in the open access journal BMC Medicine. A better understanding of how these factors can influence long-term health could help in the development of clinical strategies to improve women's health.
The four out of ten women who use antibiotics during pregnancy can breathe easy, as a comprehensive new study shows that the two most often prescribed drugs have no adverse outcome on the child's physical development. The researchers, led by Anick Bérard of the University of Montreal and its affiliated CHU Sainte-Justine children's hospital, and Hedvig Nordeng of the University of Oslo, looked at macrolides, a type of antibiotics. "With penicillin, macrolides are amongst the most used medications in the general population and in pregnancy.
Researchers conduct a systematic review of randomized clinical trials comparing the long-term effectiveness of low-fat and higher-fat dietary interventions on weight loss
Low-fat diets do not lead to greater weight loss in the long term compared to higher-fat diets (eg, low-carbohydrate or Mediterranean diets) of similar intensity, according to a large meta-analysis involving more than 68000 adults, published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology journal.
A critical component of an experiment that proved evolution happens 15 times faster than was previously believed relied upon genetic lines of chickens from Virginia Tech.
The discovery utilized the DNA of lines of White Plymouth Rock chickens that Paul Siegel has been developing for more than 50 years.
A key protein controls stem cell properties that could make them more useful in regenerative medicine, according to a study led by Mount Sinai researchers and published online today in the journal Cell Stem Cell.
Cells have characteristic sizes in different organisms and in different tissues in the same organism. How cells regulate their size and how cell size affects organism growth are among the remaining mysteries in cell biology. Research carried out at the John Innes Centre has shown that the stem cells that sustain plant growth actively control their size and that this process is important for the correct development of organs such as flowers.
This year's Nobel Prize in chemistry was given to three scientists who each focused on one piece of the DNA repair puzzle. Now a new study, reported online Oct. 28 in the journal Nature, reports the discovery of a new class of DNA repair enzyme.
HANOVER, N.H. - Dartmouth researchers have found that some proteins turn into liquid droplets on the way to becoming toxic solids implicated in neurodegenerative diseases and other genetic disorders.
The findings, along with a series of related studies by scientists at other institutions, appear in the journal Molecular Cell. A PDF of the study is available on request.
Finding parasites on fossils is a rarity, since, as we humans have experienced with a shudder, they tend to attach to skin or soft tissue and not skeleton. However, a discovery led by the University of Cincinnati not only has uncovered the ancient remnants of two parasites on marine animals, but also revealed how the parasites and hosts evolved over hundreds of years.
Scientists have found a new function of the nuclear membrane, the envelope that encases and protects DNA in the nucleus of a cell - it fixes potentially fatal breaks in DNA strands.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. - One day a few years ago, while working on wasps in a rainforest in Costa Rica, entomologist Kevin J. Loope, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Riverside, began reading about the enigmatic matricidal behavior of some social insects. In most social insects, such as bees, ants and wasps, the workers, which are all female, work their whole lives to help the queen produce new offspring. Yet, in the literature Loope found anecdotal reports of workers killing their queen, presenting a fascinating evolutionary puzzle.
A new online database will empower researchers exploring how hair follicles and the surrounding skin develop, according to an article published recently in the journal Developmental Cell. The work is central to understanding the interactions between stem cells and their environment - or "niche cells" - during fetal development, and will specifically facilitate future attempts to make skin grafts with functional hair follicles or to regenerate lost hair in patients.