Feature Channels: Cell Biology

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Released: 22-Feb-2013 1:00 PM EST
Stash of Stem Cells Found in a Human Parasite
Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI)

Researchers have now found stem cells inside the parasite that cause schistosomiasis, one of the most common parasitic infections in the world. These stem cells can regenerate worn-down organs, which may help explain how they can live for years or even decades inside their host.

Released: 19-Feb-2013 10:00 AM EST
Silencing of Retinoblastoma Gene Found to Regulate Differentiation of Myeloid Cells in Cancer
Moffitt Cancer Center

Researchers at the Moffitt Cancer Center have found a potential mechanism by which immune suppressive myeloid-derived suppressor cells can prevent immune response from developing in cancer. This mechanism includes silencing the tumor suppressor gene retinoblastoma 1 or Rb1. Their data explains a new regulatory mechanism by which myeloid-derived suppressor cells are expanded in cancer.

13-Feb-2013 12:30 PM EST
'Snooze Button' on Biological Clocks Improves Cell Adaptability
Vanderbilt University

The circadian clocks that control and influence dozens of basic biological processes have an unexpected 'snooze button' that helps cells adapt to changes in their environment.

   
Released: 14-Feb-2013 12:45 PM EST
Stay Cool and Live Longer?
University of Michigan

Scientists have known for nearly a century that cold-blooded animals, such as worms, flies and fish all live longer in cold environments, but have not known exactly why.

7-Feb-2013 12:00 PM EST
A Little Molecule’s Remarkable Feat: Prolonging Life
NYU Langone Health

Nitric oxide, the versatile gas that helps increase blood flow, transmit nerve signals, and regulate immune function, appears to perform one more biological feat— prolonging the life of an organism and fortifying it against environmental stress, according to a new study.

12-Feb-2013 8:00 PM EST
Gene Invaders Are Stymied by a Cell’s Genome Defense
University of California, San Francisco (UCSF)

Gene wars rage inside our cells, with invading DNA regularly threatening to subvert our human blueprint. Now, building on Nobel-Prize-winning findings, UC San Francisco researchers have discovered a molecular machine that helps protect a cell’s genes against these DNA interlopers.

Released: 14-Feb-2013 12:00 PM EST
Study Helps Explain Why Cells Stick Together
Georgia Institute of Technology, Research Communications

A new study provides insights into how cells stick to each other and to other bodily structures, an essential function in the formation of tissue structures and organs. It’s thought that abnormalities in their ability to do so play an important role in a broad range of disorders.

Released: 13-Feb-2013 11:15 AM EST
Long Noncoding RNAs Control Development of Fat Cells
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research

Whitehead Institute researchers report that 10 long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) play a vital role in the regulation of white fat cells. When each of these lncRNAs is individually knocked down, fat precursor cells fail to mature into white fat cells and have significantly reduced lipid droplets compared with white fat cells with unmodified lncRNA function.

Released: 12-Feb-2013 2:45 PM EST
Molecular Master Switch for Pancreatic Cancer Identified, Potential Predictor of Treatment Outcome
Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

A recently described master regulator protein may explain the development of aberrant cell growth in the pancreas spurred by inflammation.

Released: 11-Feb-2013 5:00 PM EST
Synthetic Circuit Allows Dialing Gene Expression Up or Down in Human Cells
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Scientists who built a synthetic gene circuit that allowed for the precise tuning of a gene's expression in yeast have now refined this new research tool to work in human cells, according to research published online in Nature Communications.

Released: 11-Feb-2013 3:00 PM EST
Deep Genomic Analysis Identifies a Micro RNA Opponent for Ovarian Cancer
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Researchers employed an extensive analysis of genomic information to identify a new, high-risk cohort of ovarian cancer patients, characterize their tumors, find a potential treatment and test it in mouse models of the disease.

5-Feb-2013 7:00 AM EST
Zinc Helps Against Infection by Tapping Brakes in Immune Response
Ohio State University

New research suggests that zinc helps control infections by gently tapping the brakes on the immune response in a way that prevents out-of-control inflammation that can be damaging and even deadly.

Released: 7-Feb-2013 10:00 AM EST
‘Zombie’ Cells May Outperform Live Ones as Catalysts and Conductors
Sandia National Laboratories

A simple technique uses silica to coat a living cell both inside and outside. The process forms a near-perfect replica of the cell's structure, down to the tiniest organelle. The resulting model, heated, creates nature-sculpted nanotools with components far stronger than when built out of flesh.

Released: 7-Feb-2013 8:00 AM EST
Researchers Identify Unique Peptide with Therapeutic Potential Against Cancers, Neurological Disorders, and Infectious Diseases
UT Southwestern Medical Center

UT Southwestern Medical Center scientists have synthesized a peptide that shows potential for pharmaceutical development into agents for treating infections, neurodegenerative disorders, and cancer through an ability to induce a cell-recycling process called autophagy.

Released: 5-Feb-2013 5:00 PM EST
Plants Cut the Mustard for Basic Discoveriesin Metabolism
Salk Institute for Biological Studies

You might think you have nothing in common with mustard except hotdogs. Yet based on research in a plant from the mustard family, Salk scientists have discovered a possible explanation for how organisms, including humans, directly regulate chemical reactions that quickly adjust the growth of organs. These findings overturn conventional views of how different body parts coordinate their growth, shedding light on the development of more productive plants and new therapies for metabolic diseases.

Released: 5-Feb-2013 12:00 PM EST
Giving Transplanted Cells A Nanotech Checkup
Johns Hopkins Medicine

Researchers at Johns Hopkins have devised a way to detect whether cells previously transplanted into a living animal are alive or dead, an innovation they say is likely to speed the development of cell replacement therapies for conditions such as liver failure and type 1 diabetes. As reported in the March issue of Nature Materials, the study used nanoscale pH sensors and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines to tell if liver cells injected into mice survived over time.

5-Feb-2013 10:00 AM EST
Biologists Map Rare Case of Fitness-Reducing Interaction in Nuclear, Mitochondrial DNA
Indiana University

A team of biologists from Indiana University and Brown University believes it has discovered the mechanism by which interacting mutations in mitochondrial and nuclear DNA produce an incompatible genotype that reduces reproductive fitness and delays development in fruit flies.

1-Feb-2013 10:40 AM EST
Paired Genes in Stem Cells Shed New Light on Gene Organization and Regulation
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research

Research from Whitehead Institute shows that transcription at the active promoters of protein-coding genes commonly runs in opposite directions. This leads to coordinated production of both protein-coding messenger RNAs (mRNAs) and long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs).

Released: 4-Feb-2013 1:45 PM EST
Changes to DNA On-Off Switches Affect Cells' Ability to Repair Breaks, Respond to Chemotherapy
Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

Researchers found a key determinant in the balance between two proteins, BRCA1 and 53BP1, in DNA repair machinery. Breast and ovarian cancer are associated with a breakdown in the repair systems involving these proteins.

Released: 1-Feb-2013 2:00 PM EST
Entering an Unseen World
The Rockefeller University Press

A new book presents the in-depth story about the men and women who created a new science, modern cell biology.

Released: 1-Feb-2013 9:00 AM EST
Imaging Unveils Temperature Distribution inside Living Cells
Biophysical Society

A new breakthrough marks the first time anyone has been able to show the actual temperature distribution inside living cells. This work will be presented at the 57th Annual Meeting of the Biophysical Society (BPS), held Feb. 2-6, 2013, in Philadelphia, Pa.

Released: 1-Feb-2013 9:00 AM EST
Listening to Cells: Scientists probe human cells with high-frequency sound
Biophysical Society

Researchers have developed a new non-contact, non-invasive tool to measure the mechanical properties of cells at the sub-cell scale. Their work will be presented at the 57th Annual Meeting of the Biophysical Society (BPS), held Feb. 2-6, 2013, in Philadelphia, Pa.

Released: 31-Jan-2013 5:00 PM EST
Scientists Use Amazon Cloud to View Molecular Machinery in Remarkable Detail
Salk Institute for Biological Studies

In this week's Nature Methods, Salk researchers share a how-to secret for biologists: code for Amazon Cloud that significantly reduces the time necessary to process data-intensive microscopic images.

Released: 31-Jan-2013 8:50 AM EST
Hit by Two Hammers
Stowers Institute for Medical Research

Genetic analysis by Stowers investigators has implications for a genetic disorder known as Hirschsprung Syndrome.

Released: 29-Jan-2013 10:00 PM EST
Stem Cells Boost Heart’s Natural Repair Mechanisms
Cedars-Sinai

Researchers at the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, whose clinical trial results in 2012 demonstrated that stem cell therapy reduces scarring and regenerates healthy tissue after a heart attack, now have found that the stem cell technique boosts production of existing adult heart cells (cardiomyocytes) and spurs recruitment of existing stem cells that mature into heart cells. The findings, from a laboratory animal study, are published in EMBO Molecular Medicine online.

Released: 29-Jan-2013 4:00 PM EST
“Super” Enzyme Protects Against Dangers of Oxygen
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Just like a comic book super hero, you could say that the enzyme superoxide dismutase (SOD1) has a secret identity. Since its discovery in 1969, scientists believed SOD1’s only role was to protect living cells against damage from free radicals. Now, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health have discovered that SOD1 protects cells by regulating cell energy and metabolism.

Released: 28-Jan-2013 7:30 PM EST
Diabetes Drug Could Hold Promise for Lung Cancer Patients
Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Ever since discovering a decade ago that a gene altered in lung cancer regulated an enzyme used in therapies against diabetes, Reuben Shaw has wondered if drugs originally designed to treat metabolic diseases could also work against cancer.

Released: 28-Jan-2013 3:25 PM EST
Researchers Uncover New Findings on Heat Shock Proteins That May Shed New Light on a Variety of Debilitating Diseases
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Health Sciences

UCLA researchers, in a finding that runs counter to conventional wisdom, have discovered for the first time that a gene thought to express a protein in all cells that come under stress is instead expressed only in specific cell types.

25-Jan-2013 3:00 PM EST
Protein Family Linked to Autism Suppresses the Development of Inhibitory Synapses
The Rockefeller University Press

Synapse development is promoted by a variety of cell adhesion molecules that connect neurons and organize synaptic proteins. Many of these adhesion molecules are linked to neurodevelopmental disorders; mutations in neuroligin and neurexin proteins, for example, are associated with autism and schizophrenia. According to a study in The Journal of Cell Biology, another family of proteins linked to these disorders regulates the function of neuroligins and neurexins in order to suppress the development of inhibitory synapses.

25-Jan-2013 4:45 PM EST
In Breast Cancer Metastasis, Researchers Identify Possible Drug Target
University of California, San Francisco (UCSF)

The spread of breast cancer to distant organs within the body, an event that often leads to death, appears in many cases to involve the loss of a key protein, according to UC San Francisco researchers, whose new discoveries point to possible targets for therapy.

Released: 25-Jan-2013 10:00 AM EST
Tumor Cells Engineer Acidity to Drive Cell Invasion
Moffitt Cancer Center

Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center and colleagues at Wayne State University School of Medicine investigated the acidity in solid tumors to determine if pH levels play a role in cancer cell invasion in surrounding tissues. They found that an acidic microenvironment can drive cancer cells to spread and propose that neutralizing pH would inhibit further invasion, providing a therapeutic opportunity to slow the progression of cancers.

Released: 24-Jan-2013 3:00 PM EST
Chance Finding Reveals New Control on Blood Vessels in Developing Brain
University of Wisconsin–Madison

Zhen Huang freely admits he was not interested in blood vessels four years ago when he was studying brain development in a fetal mouse. Instead, he wanted to see how changing a particular gene in brain cells called glia would affect the growth of neurons.

23-Jan-2013 3:30 PM EST
Immune Cell Suicide Alarm Helps Destroy Escaping Bacteria
University of North Carolina Health Care System

A University of North Carolina School of Medicine study may have implications for thwarting the effects of bio-terrorism attack with lethal microbes, as well as finding a way to save people in septic shock, an overwhelming bacterial infection of the blood.

Released: 24-Jan-2013 10:30 AM EST
Researchers Solve Complex Problem in Membrane Biochemistry Through Study of Amino Acids
University of Arkansas, Fayetteville

After years of experimentation, researchers at the University of Arkansas have solved a complex, decades-old problem in membrane biochemistry.

Released: 23-Jan-2013 7:00 PM EST
Right Target, but Missing the Bulls-Eye for Alzheimer’s
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Health Sciences

For decades now, researchers have been trying, without success, to develop drugs that slow or prevent Alzheimer’s. Now research at UCLA suggests that while the protein they have been focusing on-- amyloid-beta—is the right one, what’s needed is to direct a drug to a very specific location, which they’ve discovered, on that protein.

Released: 22-Jan-2013 12:10 PM EST
Vitamin D Holds Promise in Battling a Deadly Breast Cancer
Saint Louis University Medical Center

The fight against triple-negative breast cancer takes three steps forward.

Released: 22-Jan-2013 11:25 AM EST
Rice-Cell Cocktail Tough on Cancer Cells, Nice to Normal Cells
Michigan Technological University

In lab tests, juice from rice cells knocked out two kinds of human cancer cells as well or better than the potent anti-cancer drug Taxol. Plus, it did something extra: it left normal cells unharmed.

16-Jan-2013 5:40 PM EST
Researchers Show How Cells’ DNA Repair Machinery Can Destroy Viruses
Johns Hopkins Medicine

A team of researchers based at Johns Hopkins has decoded a system that makes certain types of immune cells impervious to HIV infection. The system’s two vital components are high levels of a molecule that becomes embedded in viral DNA like a code written in invisible ink, and an enzyme that, when it reads the code, switches from repairing the DNA to chopping it up into unusable pieces.

18-Jan-2013 3:00 PM EST
Molecular Forces Are Key to Proper Cell Division
University of Massachusetts Amherst

New details emerge about a molecular surveillance system that helps detect and correct errors in mitosis that can lead to cell death or human diseases. Biologists can watch and record images of the key players including microtubules, kinetochores, molecular engines and the polar ejection force.

18-Jan-2013 5:00 PM EST
La Jolla Institute Identifies Molecular Switch Enabling Immune Cells to Better Fight Disease
La Jolla Institute for Immunology

A research team led by the La Jolla Institute for Allergy & Immunology has discovered the mechanism that enables CD4 helper T cells to assume the more aggressive role of killer T cells in mounting an immune attack against viruses, cancerous tumors and other damaged or infected cells. The finding, made in collaboration with researchers from the RIKEN Institute in Japan, could enable the development of more potent drugs for AIDS, cancer and many other diseases based on using this mechanism to trigger larger armies of killer T cells against infected or damaged cells.

Released: 18-Jan-2013 8:00 AM EST
A Molecular Assembly Line Brings Muscles Into Shape
IMP - Research Institute of Molecular Pathology

Scientists at the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna, Austria and at the University of Cologne, Germany have discovered the molecular basis underlying the patterned folding and assembly of muscle proteins. They describe the strikingly new mechanism in the current issue of Cell.

Released: 17-Jan-2013 2:30 PM EST
Researchers Use Luminescent Mice to Track Cancer and Aging in Real-Time
University of North Carolina Health Care System

In a study published in the January 18 issue of Cell, researchers from the University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center have developed a new method to visualize aging and tumor growth in mice using a gene closely linked to these processes.

17-Jan-2013 9:00 AM EST
Scientists Shed Light on the “Dark Matter” of DNA
IMP - Research Institute of Molecular Pathology

In each cell, thousands of regulatory regions control which genes are active at any time. Scientists at the Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna developed a method that reliably detects these regions and measures their activity. The new technology is published online by Science this week.

14-Jan-2013 12:25 PM EST
How Cells Know When It’s Time to Eat Themselves
UC San Diego Health

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have identified a molecular mechanism regulating autophagy, a fundamental stress response used by cells to help ensure their survival in adverse conditions.

15-Jan-2013 12:00 PM EST
Drug Targets Hard-to-Reach Leukemia Stem Cells Responsible for Relapses
UC San Diego Health

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have discovered that hard-to-reach, drug-resistant leukemia stem cells (LSCs) that overexpress multiple pro-survival protein forms are sensitive – and thus vulnerable – to a novel cancer stem cell-targeting drug currently under development.

15-Jan-2013 4:25 PM EST
Researchers Discover How the Flu Virus Tells Time
Mount Sinai Health System

According to researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, the flu knows how much time it has to multiply, infect other cells, and spread to another human being. If it leaves a cell too soon, the virus is too weak. If it leaves too late, the immune system has time to kill the virus.

16-Jan-2013 10:50 AM EST
Immunology Research Sheds New Light on Cell Function, Response
Kansas State University

Researchers characterized a new protein that affects how cells in the innate immune system function and protect humans against invading bacteria such as E. coli O157:H7.

Released: 14-Jan-2013 12:00 PM EST
Team Finds Gene That Promotes Drug Resistance in Cancer
University of Iowa

Scientists at the UI and BYU have identified a gene that induces drug resistance in cancer. The finding could improve prognostic and diagnostic tools for evaluating cancer and monitoring response to treatment, and could lead to new therapies for eradicating drug-resistant cancer cells.

Released: 14-Jan-2013 10:20 AM EST
Cancer Suppressor Gene Links Metabolism with Cellular Aging
Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

Researchers have identified a class of p53 target genes and regulatory molecules that represent more promising therapeutic candidates. p53 participates in a molecular feedback circuit with malic enzymes, thereby showing that p53 activity is also involved in regulating metabolism.



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