It may look like mistletoe wrapped around a flexible candy cane. But this molecular model shows how some proteins form loops in DNA when they chemically attach, or bind, at separate sites to the double-helical molecule that carries life’s genetic blueprint.
“Nanoscale science and engineering promise to be as important as the steam engine, the transistor, and the Internet, and have the potential to revolutionize all other technologies” according to Neal Lane, former science advisor to US President Bill Clinton. “But that outcome is not guaranteed.”Dr. Lane made his remarks today at a Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies event at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine are closer to understanding how the sense of taste develops. They have pinpointed a molecular pathway that regulates the development of taste buds. Using genetically engineered mice, they discovered that a signaling pathway activated by small proteins called Wnts is required for initiating taste-bud formation. They have also determined that Wnt proteins are required for hooking up the wiring of taste signals to the brain.
Computer scientists at Carnegie Mellon University are using data mining techniques to identify perpetrators of fraud among online auction users as well as their otherwise unknown accomplices.The new method analyzes publicly available histories of transactions posted by online auction sites such as eBay and identifies suspicious online behaviors and dubious associations among users.
The good health habits of adolescent Asian immigrants improve with each generation born in the United States, but health habits among adolescent Latino immigrants generally remain poor or become worse in succeeding generations, according to a RAND Corporation study issued today.
The early stages of coronary artery disease in young smokers can be reversed quickly if they choose to put out their cigarettes for good, according to a positron emission tomography (PET) imaging study in the December Journal of Nuclear Medicine.
Screening children for risk factors associated with cardiovascular disease can help identify parents at risk for the condition, providing an opportunity for medical intervention in both children and their parents, according to research at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC.
Researchers from Lehigh and Princeton Universities join with colleagues from Egypt and Portugal to take aim at osteoporosis and other bone disorders. Their goal is to tailor a biocompatible glass so it can serve as a scaffold that promotes the regrowth of damaged or diseased bone.
Teenage girls who weigh themselves frequently are more likely to binge eat and participate in unhealthy weight control behaviors in the future, according to new research from the University of Minnesota School of Public Health.
A new study by researchers in the UK has found that psychopaths have biological brain differences that make them stand apart from other normal people. The research appears in the British Journal of Psychiatry.