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Chemists from the Universities of Basel and Zurich in Switzerland have come one step closer to generating energy from sunlight: for the first time, they were able to reproduce one of the crucial phases of natural photosynthesis with artificial molecules. Their results have been published by the journal Angewandte Chemie (international edition).

Scientists at KIT (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology) detected an important mechanism in the evolution of plant genomes: Using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model organism, they studied the formation of tandem repeat DNA sequences and found out that these sequences form if both DNA strands are broken at a significant distance from each other. For their experiments, the scientists used CRISPR/Cas system, working like a "pair of molecular scissors." The results are presented in the PNAS journal. (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1603823113)

What used to take several weeks is now possible in two days: thanks to new molecular-based methods, mycobacterial pathogens that cause pulmonary infections or tuberculosis can now be detected much more quickly. Time-consuming bacteria cultures no longer need to be taken from the patient samples, meaning that a suitable therapy can be started quickly.

Toxic arsenic initially accumulates in the nuclei of plants' cells. This has been revealed by an X-ray examination of the aquatic plant rigid hornwort (Ceratophyllum demersum) using DESY's X-ray source PETRA III. Even at comparatively low concentrations, the arsenic also floods the vacuole, a liquid-filled cavity which takes up most of the cell.

With a surface resembling that of plants, solar cells improve light-harvesting and thus generate more power. Scientists of KIT (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology) reproduced the epidermal cells of rose petals that have particularly good antireflection properties and integrated the transparent replicas into an organic solar cell. This resulted in a relative efficiency gain of twelve percent. An article on this subject has been published recently in the Advanced Optical Materials journal (DOI: 10.1002/adom.201600046).

Those who go to a masked ball consciously slip into a different role, in order to avoid being recognized so quickly. Insects were already doing something very similar in the Cretaceous: They cloaked themselves in pieces of plants, grains of sand, or the remains of their prey, in order, for example, to be invisible to predators. An international research team, with participation from the University of Bonn, has now investigated such "invisibility cloaks" encased in amber. The custom-tailored "costumes" also permit conclusions about the habitat at the time.

One possible cause of the alarming bee mortality we are witnessing is the use of the very active systemic insecticides called neonicotinoids. A previously unknown and harmful effect of neonicotinoids has been identified by researchers at the Mainz University Medical Center and Goethe University Frankfurt. They discovered that neonicotinoids in low and field-relevant concentrations reduce the concentration of acetylcholine in the royal jelly/larval food secreted by nurse bees. This signaling molecule is relevant for the development of the honeybee larvae.

DALLAS - June 24, 2016 - People who visit their primary care physicians are more likely to get potentially life-saving colon cancer screenings and follow up on abnormal stool blood test results - even in health systems that heavily promote mail-in home stool blood tests that don't require a doctor visit, a study involving UT Southwestern population health researchers shows.

The use of medical marijuana for millions of patients suffering from a wide range of health conditions and the subsequent therapeutic benefits has long been documented. Twenty-three states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Guam, have determined that Cannabis sativa (a.k.a. marijuana) can benefit patients suffering from a wide range of conditions, including cancer, epilepsy, chronic pain, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Drug treatments for breast cancer patients might soon be designed based on the unique genetic autograph of their tumor.

As people get older, they become choosier about how they spend their time and with whom they spend it. Now, researchers reporting in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on June 23 find, based on a series of experimental and behavioral studies, that similar changes take place in Barbary macaques. The findings offer an evolutionary perspective on why aging humans behave as they do, according to the researchers.

Rabies virus (RABV) transmitted by dogs is responsible for an estimated 60,000 human deaths per year, especially in Asia and Africa. If humans bitten by a rabid animal are treated quickly, the disease can usually be prevented. Such post-exposure prophylaxis is expensive and should be reserved for bites from animals with confirmed infection, but testing dogs for rabies in resource-poor settings is challenging. A study published in PLOS NTDs reports that six commercially available rapid rabies tests--which could make testing dogs much easier--fail to reproducibly yield accurate results.

Finding out which is the highest mountain in the US Arctic may be the last thing on your mind, unless you are an explorer who skis from the tallest peaks around the globe. Ski mountaineer Kit DesLauriers joined forces with glaciologist Matt Nolan to settle a debate of more than 50 years, while testing a new, affordable mapping technique in a steep mountainous region. Their research is published today (23 June) in The Cryosphere, an open access journal of the European Geosciences Union (EGU).

Researchers have improved the integration of disparate sources and types of data which will advance scientists' understanding of disease using Wikipathways. This study, published in PLOS Computational Biology, will help other scientists better utilize open data and will aid the discovery of new therapeutic targets for disease.

Offering insights into a long-standing and mysterious bias in biology, a new study reveals how and why mitochondria are only passed on through a mother's egg - and not the father's sperm. What's more, experiments from the study show that when paternal mitochondria persist for longer than they should during development, the embryo is at greater risk of lethality. Harbored inside the cells of nearly all multicellular animals, plants and fungi are mitochondria, organelles that play an important role in generating the energy that cells need to survive.