Feature Channels: Cell Biology

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Johns Hopkins researchers report they have figured out how the aptly named protein Botch blocks the signaling protein called Notch, which helps regulate development. In a report on the discovery, to appear online April 24 in the journal Cell Reports, the scientists say they expect the work to lead to a better understanding of how a single protein, Notch, directs actions needed for the healthy development of organs as diverse as brains and kidneys.

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The lab of Whitehead Institute Member Peter Reddien is introducing the scientific community to the three-banded panther worm (Hofstenia miamia), a small organism with the ability to regenerate any missing body part. As a model, Hofstenia could help further our understanding of regeneration, how its mechanisms have evolved over millennia, and what limits regeneration in other animals, including humans. Intriguingly, Hofstenia and the planarian Schmidtea mediterranea—long the mainstay of Reddien’s research—rely on similar molecular pathways to control regeneration despite having evolved separately over the course of roughly 550 million years.

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A team of scientists led by a researcher from the Cancer Science Institute of Singapore (CSI Singapore) at the National University of Singapore has identified the cancer specific stem cell which causes gastric cancer. This discovery opens up the possibility of developing new drugs for the treatment of this disease and other types of cancers.

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Over 15 mammalian clock proteins have been identified, but researchers surmise there are more. Could big-data approaches help find them? To accelerate clock-gene discovery, the investigators used a computer-assisted approach to identify and rank candidate clock components, which they liken to online Netflix-like profiling of movie suggestions for customers. This approach found a new core clock gene, which the team named CHRONO.

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As people around the world mark Earth Day (April 22) with activities that protect the planet, our cells are busy safeguarding their own environment.

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Researchers from MIT’s Koch Institute, the Broad Institute, and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute come together to overcome the barriers to sequencing circulating tumor cells.

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Researchers have found a common link between muscle weakness in alcoholics and mitochondrial disease: mitochondria that are unable to self-repair. The research could lead to both a new diagnostics for mitochondrial disease and a new drug target.

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A team of researchers from Columbia University Medical Center (CUMC), Weill Cornell Medical College, and Brandeis University has devised a wholly new approach to the treatment of Alzheimer's disease involving the so-called retromer protein complex. Retromer plays a vital role in neurons, steering amyloid precursor protein (APP) away from a region of the cell where APP is cleaved, creating the potentially toxic byproduct amyloid-beta, which is thought to contribute to the development of Alzheimer's.

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Sanford-Burnham researchers discover that the interaction between two proteins called BCAR1 and BCAR3 is responsible for resistance to antiestrogen drugs, paving the way for improved diagnostic and treatment strategies.

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An international team led by researchers at UC Davis has shown that the cyclin B1/Cdk1 protein complex, which plays a key role in cell division, also boosts the mitochondrial activity to power that process. This is the first time the complex has been shown to perform both jobs. This newfound ability could make cyclin B1/Cdk1 an excellent target to control cellular energy production, potentially advancing cancer care and regenerative medicine. The research was published online today in the journal Developmental Cell.

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Cell movement plays an important role in a host of biological functions from embryonic development to repairing wounded tissue. It also enables cancer cells to break free from their sites of origin and migrate throughout the body.

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PCNA is a protein essential to DNA repair and replication, and City of Hope researchers are targeting it in neuroblastoma cells in order to halt tumor growth and induce cell death.

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Case Western Reserve University dental researchers have found a less invasive way to extract single rare immune cells from the mouth to study how the mouth’s natural defenses ward off infection and inflammation.

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City of Hope researchers found that a microRNA called miR-105 helps cancer metastasize by breaking down the building blocks of blood vessels' barriers, allowing the cancer cells to enter the bloodstream.

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Researchers reveal novel cellular and molecular elements of muscle repair. The study explains how drugs can induce regeneration, while preventing fibrosis and fat deposition, in dystrophic muscle at early stages of Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

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Stuart Lindsay and his colleagues at Arizona State University have taken a major step in demonstrating the accurate identification of amino acids by briefly pinning each in a narrow junction between a pair of flanking electrodes and measuring a characteristic chain of current spikes passing through successive amino acid molecules.

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A team led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has identified a long-sought protein that facilitates one of the most basic functions of cells: regulating their volume to keep from swelling excessively.

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Researchers have developed a new understanding of the T-cell recognition process by describing how T-cell receptors use mechanical contact – the forces involved in their binding to antigens – to make decisions about whether or not the cells they encounter are threats.

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Building antibiotic compounds at the molecular level requires precision and specialized tools. NC State research may turn an enzyme that acts as a specialized “wrench” in antibiotic assembly into a set of wrenches that will allow for greater customization.

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University of Montreal researchers have discovered how a component of the Epstein Barr (EBV) virus takes over our cells gene regulating machinery, allowing the virus to replicate itself.

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As one of the most widely consumed and commercially important beverages on the planet, one would expect the experts to know everything there is to know about lager beer. Now, however, scientists are beginning to color in the margins of yeast ecology and genetics, identifying new strains in new environments and using the tools of molecular biology to ferret out traits that could aid industrial fermentation technologies.

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The push and pull of physical force can cause profound changes in the behavior of a cell. Two studies from researchers working at the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center reveal how cells respond to mechanical manipulation

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Researchers at UAB report a genetically engineered herpes simplex viral therapy is safe when used in conjunction with radiation in the treatment of malignant gliomas, one of the most deadly forms of brain cancer. The virus, G207, is a modified herpes simplex virus that in two previous UAB studies has been shown to be safe when used as a sole therapy. The new findings indicate the virus is also safe when used in combination with low doses of radiation therapy.

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The University of Pennsylvania’s Institute for Regenerative Medicine will host a symposium on Friday, April 11, 2014 to detail the progress researchers are making toward reprogramming human cells to treat a variety of diseases.

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Chlorine bleach has been used as a disinfectant for hundreds of years, but our bodies have been using its active component to help kill invading bacteria for millennia. Details about how bleach kills—and how bacteria can survive the attack—may lead to the development of new drugs.

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In a study published in the April 6 online edition of the journal Nature, a team of Columbia University Medical Center researchers led by Ellen Lumpkin, PhD, associate professor of somatosensory biology, solve an age-old mystery of touch: how cells just beneath the skin surface enable us to feel fine details and textures.

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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have found that too little or too much of an enzyme called SRPK1 promotes cancer by disrupting a regulatory event critical for many fundamental cellular processes, including proliferation.

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In textbooks, the grand-finale of cell division is the tug-of-war fought inside dividing cells as duplicated pairs of chromosomes get dragged in opposite directions into daughter cells. This process, called mitosis, is visually stunning to observe under a microscope. Equally stunning to cell biologists are the preparatory steps cells take to ensure that the process occurs safely.

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Tweaking a specific cell type’s ability to absorb potassium in the brain improved walking and prolonged survival in a mouse model of Huntington’s disease, reports a UCLA study in Nature Neuroscience. The discovery could point to new drug targets for treating the devastating disease, which strikes one in every 20,000 Americans.

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Scientists at the Center for Nanotechnology and Nanotoxicology at Harvard School of Public Health have discovered a way to measure the effective density of engineered nanoparticles in physiological fluids, making it possible to determine the amount of nanomaterials that come into contact with cells and tissue in culture.

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An international team of scientists led by Jef Boeke, PhD, director of NYU Langone Medical Center’s Institute for Systems Genetics, has synthesized the first functional chromosome in yeast, an important step in the emerging field of synthetic biology, designing microorganisms to produce novel medicines, raw materials for food, and biofuels.

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Mitochondria, long known as “cellular power plants” for their generation of the key energy source adenosine triphosphate (ATP), are essential for proper cellular functions. Mitochondrial defects are often observed in a variety of diseases, including cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and Parkinson’s disease, and are the hallmarks of a number of untreatable genetic mitochondrial disorders whose manifestations range from muscle weakness to organ failure. Whitehead Institute scientists have identified a protein whose inhibition could hold the key to alleviating suffering caused by such disorders.

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Infectious disease specialists at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center have identified a protein that regulates the body’s immune response to cytomegalovirus (CMV), a common pathogen that causes lifelong infections and can lead to devastating illness in newborns and those with weakened immune systems.

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Just as archeologists try to decipher ancient tablets to discern their meaning, UT Southwestern Medical Center cancer biologists are working to decode the purpose of an ancient gene considered one of the most important in cancer research.

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Premi Haynes, a physiology Ph.D. candidate in the Campbell Muscle Lab, has documented the different cellular patterns and mechanical functions in contractions of the human heart. The findings indicate possible therapeutic targets for treatment of disease and heart failure.

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New research suggests that gut microorganisms do not merely influence immune cell function, but also support the production of immune cells that form the first line of defense against infection. By understanding the mechanisms responsible for maintaining and replacing immune cells, researchers hope to one day develop targeted therapies to support and boost immune function in humans.

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The tumor suppressor p53 does all it can to prevent oncogenes from transforming normal cells into tumor cells. Sometimes oncogenes manage to initiate tumor development in the presence of p53, which focuses its efforts instead on limiting the tumor’s ability to invade and metastasize. Researchers uncover one way that p53 acts to prevent cancer cell invasion.

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The process of producing high-quality, fertile sperm requires many steps. Researchers show the transcription factor p73 promotes this process by regulating the adhesions between developing sperm and their support cells.

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Biologists have discovered that when biological signals hit cells in rhythmic waves, the magnitude of the cells' response can depend on the number of signaling cycles — not their strength or duration.

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Scientists at Indiana University have unlocked one of the mysteries of modern genetics: how acquired traits can be passed between generations in a process called epigenetic inheritance.

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RNA encodes the proteins that play a key role in cellular reproduction, but the manner in which cells regulate its removal once these proteins are synthesized remains a mystery. One piece of this mystery has been solved as researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who have identified the steps by which a cell removes RNA from the cytoplasm.

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The protein, Dom34, appears to “rescue” protein-making factories called ribosomes when they get stuck obeying defective genetic instructions.

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Adenomatous polyposis coli is critical in protecting against colon cancer. KU Cancer Center researchers have shown that APC stationed in the nucleus is necessary to suppress Wnt and its signaling partners.

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University of Adelaide mathematicians have devised a method for identifying how cell clusters have formed by analysing an image of the cluster.

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The immune system plays a pivotal role in targeting cancer cells for destruction. However, tumor cells are smart and have developed ways to avoid immune detection. A collaborative team of researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center recently discovered a novel mechanism that lung cancer cells use to block detection by a type of immune cell called a natural killer cell (NK cell).

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The Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) at the Université de Montréal (UdeM), in collaboration with the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital’s Quebec Leukemia Cell Bank, recently achieved a significant breakthrough thanks to the laboratory growth of leukemic stem cells, which will speed up the development of new cancer drugs.

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A team of biologists and engineers at the University of California, San Diego has discovered that white blood cells, which repair damaged tissue as part of the body’s immune response, move to inflamed sites by walking in a stepwise manner. The cells periodically form and break adhesions mainly under two “feet,” and generate the traction forces that propel them forward by the coordinated action of contractile proteins. Their discovery, published March 17 in the Journal of Cell Biology, is an important advance toward developing new pharmacological strategies to treat chronic inflammatory diseases such as arthritis, irritable bowel syndrome, Type 1 diabetes, and multiple sclerosis.

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A Stony Brook University-led international research team has discovered how a cellular protein, STAT3, which is overactive in a majority of cancers, interferes with an antitumor mechanism in cells and therefore promotes the growth of cancer.

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New research by UC San Francisco neuroscientists suggests that the body may get help in fast-changing situations from a specialized brain circuit that causes visual system neurons to fire more strongly during locomotion.

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Heart attack and stroke are among the most serious threats to health. But novel research at UT Southwestern Medical Center has linked two major biological processes that occur at the onset of these traumatic events and, ultimately, can lead to protection for the heart.