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A research collaboration that combines novel "big-data" informatics tools with expertise in basic biology has uncovered details of an essential process in life: how a crucial enzyme locates the site on DNA where it begins to direct the synthesis of RNA. This finding may aid in the discovery of new antimicrobial medicines, and the powerful technological approaches developed for this research may shed light on other essential cellular processes.

In areas that undergo rapid urbanization in low-income countries the safe management of wastewater and fecal sludge is vital to ensure the health of the growing population. In particular, contact with human and animal fecal waste is a risk factor for parasitic infections such as hookworms and intestinal protozoa.

SCIENTISTS have made a groundbreaking discovery in understanding how the genetic complexity of tumours can be recognised and exploited by the immune system, even when the disease is at its most advanced stages.

The findings, by researchers funded by Cancer Research UK and the Rosetrees Trust, could guide future immunotherapies and improve the way existing immunotherapy drugs are used.

As a tumour develops, the diversity of its genetic faults can be flagged on the cancer cell surface, as unique mutations appear in different parts of the tumour.

Coral snake venom carries significant neurotoxicity and human injuries can be severe or even lethal. Despite this, antivenom treatments are scarce due to challenges collecting adequate amounts of venom needed to produce anti-elapidic serum. PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases highlights exciting new research from the Butantan Institute in Brazil using synthetically designed DNA to produce coral-snake antivenom.

PLEASANTON, Calif.--March 3, 2016--10x Genomics, a company focused on improving and broadening the application of genomic information across healthcare and other industries, today announced the publication of a study that was enabled by the company's GemCode™ technology platform, a powerful new approach that allows researchers to discover previously inaccessible genomic information. The research analyzed the biomedical consequences of adult humans with gene knockouts, and the impact of one specific knockout on genetic recombination patterns.

Is investment in research to develop new treatments the best approach to controlling cancer? Would emphasizing prevention bring about more return on investment? Should we channel what we are learning about precision medicine and the genome into cancer prevention, not treatment alone?

Pristionchus nematodes come in two varieties: Most species consist of typical males and females, but in several species the females have evolved the ability to produce and use their own sperm for reproduction. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute of Developmental Biology in Tübingen, Germany, discovered that these so called hermaphrodites have shorter lifespans, with females frequently living over twice as long as closely related hermaphrodites.

DURHAM, N.C. - One of the most crucial and elusive goals of an effective HIV vaccine is to stimulate antibodies that can attack the virus even as it relentlessly mutates.

Now a research team, led by investigators at the Duke Human Vaccine Institute and the Vaccine Research Center of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has tracked rare potent antibodies in an HIV-infected individual and determined sequential structures that point to how they developed.

For most guys in the animal kingdom, sex is a once-and-done event. Females from species like rabbits and cows get sperm from their mates and not much else. But in a Forum article published March 3 in Trends in Ecology & Evolution, researchers suggest that these limited encounters can supply resources to females in seminal fluid, and females might have evolved to seek out such seminal resources, even when the amount of fluid is small.

EPFL scientists have developed an animal model for breast cancer that faithfully captures the disease. Tested on human breast tissue, this the most clinically realistic model of breast cancer to date.

PHILADELPHIA--(March 3, 2016)--P53, a tumor suppressor gene that is mutated and inactivated in the vast majority of cancers, has often been described as the "guardian of the genome" because of its protective effects against cancer. Now, researchers at The Wistar Institute are also making the case for p53 as the "guardian of obesity," having found that a variant of the gene is heavily implicated in metabolism, which may lead to obesity and the development of type 2 diabetes. Study results are published in the journal Cell Reports.

Researchers at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have uncovered a new pathway for mitochondrial cell death that involves the protein BCL-2 ovarian killer otherwise known as BOK. The discovery, which is described online in the journal Cell, may lead to new ways to trigger cell death in some types of cancer cells.

PHILADELPHIA - Inhibiting the transfer of calcium ions into the cell's powerhouse is specifically toxic to cancer cells, according to an article published this week in Cell Reports by researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Patients with heart failure often have a buildup of scar tissue that leads to a gradual loss of heart function. In a new study published today in the journal Cell Stem Cell, researchers from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine report significant progress toward a novel approach that could shrink the amount of heart scar tissue while replenishing the supply of healthy heart muscle.

Scientists at the Gladstone Institutes have discovered how to make a new type of cell that is in between embryonic stem cells and adult heart cells, and that may hold the key to treating heart disease. These induced expandable cardiovascular progenitor cells (ieCPCs) can organically develop into heart cells, while still being able to replicate. When injected into a mouse after a heart attack, the cells improved heart function dramatically.