Curated News: PNAS

• share
• favorite_border

Cornell University-led research reports that two local fungal pathogens could potentially curb an invasive insect that has New York vineyard owners on edge.

• share
• favorite_border

A recent discovery by Columbia Engineering researchers explains a new family of gravitational instabilities in granular particles of different densities that are driven by a gas-channeling mechanism not seen in fluids. The team observed an unexpected Rayleigh-Taylor (R-T)-like instability in which lighter grains rise through heavier grains in the form of “fingers” and “granular bubbles, similar to the bubbles that form and rise in lava lamps.

• share
• favorite_border

Gestures and visual animations can help reveal the cognitive origins of meaning, indicating that our minds can assign a linguistic structure to new informational content “on the fly”—even if it is not linguistic in nature.

• share
• favorite_border

The immune system occasionally makes mistakes that require correction. For example, in autoimmunity, T-cells lose "immune tolerance" of self and can destroy one's very own tissues. Conversely, in cancer, the immune system can rapidly exhaust itself in the face of tumor antigens and become unresponsive, allowing tumors to thrive.

• share
• favorite_border

Biomedical engineers have developed a system that can study 10s to 100s of programmed bacteria within mini-tissues in a dish, condensing study time from months to days. The speed and high throughput of their technology allows for stable growth of bacteria within tumor spheroids and can also be used for other bacteria species and cell types. The team says this study is the first to rapidly screen and characterize bacteria therapies in vitro.

• share
• favorite_border

Cross-referencing a decade of Google searches and citizen science observations, researchers have determined which of 621 North American bird species are currently the most popular and which characteristics of species drive human interest. Study findings have just been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

• share
• favorite_border

Studies of a river used in 20th-century logging shows that the bedrock has eroded to create a new channel. Such human-driven geology may be common worldwide.

• share
• favorite_border

A team led by researchers at the University of Washington has developed synthetic peptides that target and inhibit the small, toxic protein aggregates that are thought to trigger Alzheimer's disease.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists discovered how iron atoms continually re-arrange on surfaces, offering insights into metal corrosion and soil remediation.

• share
• favorite_border

New research finds that Black and Latino adolescent boys who are stopped by police report more frequent engagement in delinquent behavior thereafter. The study also demonstrates that police stops have a negative impact on the adolescents’ psychological well-being.

• share
• favorite_border

New research points to a potential way to prevent acute liver damage, or even treat it -- as well as a possible way to better monitor the health of patients who have suffered from it. It's based on the discovery that a protein involved in one of the liver’s most basic functions also sounds the alarm when liver cells get hurt.

• share
• favorite_border

An ancient group of people made ritual offerings to supernatural deities near the Island of the Sun in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia, about 500 years earlier than the Incas, according to an international team of researchers. The team's findings suggest that organized religion emerged much earlier in the region than previously thought.

• share
• favorite_border

A new paper in PNAS finds that the previously thought mechanism for ice formation in humid but unsaturated conditions (like those in which cirrus clouds form) doesn’t work. Instead, another mechanism better explains ice (and thus cloud) formation – and the details are far from foggy.

• share
• favorite_border

A medicine currently being tested as a chemoprevention agent for multiple types of cancer has more than one trick in its bag when it comes to preventing stomach cancer, Vanderbilt researchers have discovered.

• share
• favorite_border

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is no longer a death sentence, yet a cure remains elusive. While current therapies can successfully manage active infection, the virus can survive in tissue reservoirs – including macrophage cells, which play an important role in the immune system.

• share
• favorite_border

Your cells are on the move. Immune cells rove your body hunting for pathogens; cells organize to assemble complex organs; skin cells pull together to heal wounds; and rogue cancer cells migrate and metastasize. Without this remarkable ability to coordinate movement, cells could not divide or reach their proper place in the body. This leads to diseases, such as cardiovascular disorders, Parkinson's disease and cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists reveal the importance of an amino acid that supplies energy and protection for microbial communities deep underground.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists continue to find evidence linking Type 2 diabetes with Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia and the seventh leading cause of death in the United States. However, little is understood about the mechanism by which the two are connected.Now, researchers at Joslin Diabetes Center, an affiliate of Harvard Medical School, have demonstrated that impaired insulin signaling in the brain negatively affects cognition, mood and metabolism, all components of Alzheimer’s Disease.

• share
• favorite_border

New University of Montana research suggests climate change makes it increasingly difficult for tree seedlings to regenerate following wildfires in low-elevation forests, which could contribute to abrupt forest loss.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists show metabolic tradeoffs result from a specific change to the grow-defend balance.

• share
• favorite_border

Columbia Engineering researchers have shown—for the first time—that they can use online neurofeedback to modify an individual's arousal state to improve performance in a demanding sensory motor task, such as flying a plane or driving in suboptimal conditions.

• share
• favorite_border

By measuring the effect of every gene in the genome, one by one, researchers at the University of Iowa, University of Southern California, and University of California, San Francisco, have identified a new target that may help improve treatment for children with relapsed B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL).

• share
• favorite_border

Montreal research team unravels an adaptive mechanism involved in controlling insulin action, showing that glucagon plays a crucial part in it and can thus be a protective asset.

• share
• favorite_border

Laws that require landlords to disclose bed bug infestations help combat the spread of the insects and protect the health of potential tenants. According to a new study, these laws also lead to cost savings, on average, for landlords within five years. Researchers in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania published their findings today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

• share
• favorite_border

Policies requiring landlords to disclose bedbug infestations are an effective way to reduce the prevalence of infestations, according to a just-published study. The study's mathematical model says policies can lead to modest, short-term costs to landlords, but ultimately result in savings to landlords and tenants.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study shows climate change may have contributed to the decline of Cahokia, a famed prehistoric city near present-day St. Louis. And it involves ancient human poop.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study shows vigorous exercise and fasting improve the ability of human and mouse cells to remove misfolded, toxic, unnecessary proteins Hormones, including adrenaline and glucagon—released during food deprivation and intense physical activity—boost cells’ capacity to dispose of defective proteins The findings reveal a previously unknown mechanism that activates the cells’ protein-disposal machinery, allowing them to adapt their protein content to shifting demands and new conditions The findings set the stage for development of therapies that activate the cells’ protein-disposal system and optimize the body’s natural defenses

• share
• favorite_border

A new map of newborn babies’ brains offers details of structure that will provide a new reference for researchers studying both typical brain development and neurological disorders. Using noninvasive, 20-minute MRI scans, researchers have revealed some of the complex and precisely organized brain architecture that emerges as the brain reshapes itself during the third trimester of pregnancy.

• share
• favorite_border

Plants are master chemists, and Michigan State University researchers have unlocked their secret of producing specialized metabolites. The research, published in the latest issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, combined plant biology and machine learning to sort through tens of thousands of genes to determine which genes make specialized metabolites.

• share
• favorite_border

By examining how mammary cells respond in a stiffness-changing hydrogel, researchers discovered that several pathways work together to signal breast cells to turn cancerous. The work could inspire new approaches to treating patients and inhibiting tumor growth.

• share
• favorite_border

A detailed analysis of blood samples from Ebola patients is providing clues about the progression of the effects of the virus in patients and potential treatment pathways. The findings point to a critical role for a molecular pathway that relies on the common nutrient choline, as well as the importance of cellular bodies known as microvesicles.

• share
• favorite_border

New research by neuroscientists at the University of Chicago shows that as neurons process information about texture from the skin, they each respond differently to various features of a surface, creating a high-dimensional representation of texture in the brain.

• share
• favorite_border

Direct interactions dominate ion adsorption to aqueous graphene, a process central to vital processes in energy technology.

• share
• favorite_border

Women's brains appear to be three years younger than men's of the same age, according to a study of brain metabolism by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The findings could explain why women maintain their cognitive skills longer than men.

• share
• favorite_border

An international team of collaborators found that the CD4 surface protein, which is used by HIV and SIV as the receptor to enter immune cells, is highly variable among wild chimpanzees.

• share
• favorite_border

PNNL researchers have been able to observe in unprecedented detail how rust happens.

• share
• favorite_border

In a recent groundbreaking study, a team of researchers led by BIDMC’s Dipak Panigrahy, MD, demonstrated that dead and dying cancer cells killed by conventional cancer treatments paradoxically trigger the inflammation that promotes tumor growth and metastasis. Now, in a follow- up study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), Panigrahy and colleagues illuminate the mechanism by which debris generated by ovarian tumor cells targeted by first-line chemotherapy accelerates tumor progression.

• share
• favorite_border

Greenland is melting faster than scientists previously thought—and will likely lead to faster sea level rise—thanks to the continued, accelerating warming of the Earth’s atmosphere, a new study has found.

• share
• favorite_border

Paleontologists at the University of Chicago have discovered the first detailed fossil of a hagfish, the slimy, eel-like carrion feeders of the ocean. The 100-million-year-old fossil helps answer questions about when these ancient, jawless fish branched off the evolutionary tree from the lineage that gave rise to modern-day jawed vertebrates, including bony fish and humans.

• share
• favorite_border

A new computational model could potentially boost efficiencies and profits in natural gas production by better predicting previously hidden fracture mechanics. It also accurately accounts for the known amounts of gas released during the process.

• share
• favorite_border

Using one of the most powerful microscopes in the world, scientists from Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (SBP) and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-Chapel Hill) have identified a dense, dynamic and disorganized actin filament nanoscaffold—resembling a haystack—that is induced in response to a molecular signal. This is the first time researchers have directly visualized, at the molecular level, a structure that is triggered in response to a cellular signal—a key finding that expands our understanding of how cells move. The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS).

• share
• favorite_border

How yeast partition carbon into a metabolite may offer insights into boosting production for biofuels.

• share
• favorite_border

Screening method shows promise as a key to faster therapeutic innovation

• share
• favorite_border

About 3.4 million Americans, or 1.2 percent of the population, have active epilepsy. Although the majority respond to medication, between 20 and 40 percent of patients with epilepsy continue to have seizures even after trying multiple anti-seizure drugs.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists explore how drought-tolerant plants communicate to nearby microorganisms, suggesting ways to engineer more resilient bioenergy crops.

• share
• favorite_border

Research in mouse cells identifies defective metabolic pathway in aging immune T cells. The pathway is critical for switching T cells from dormancy into illness-fighting mode. In experiments, researchers restored lagging T-cell function by adding small-molecule compounds. Findings suggest possible mechanism behind weakened immunity common in the elderly.

• share
• favorite_border

Researchers discover how certain bacteria may safeguard plant growth during a drought, making way for strategies to improve crop productivity.

• share
• favorite_border

If you are wondering how long you personally are willing to stand in line to buy that hot new holiday gift, scientists at Johns Hopkins Medicine say the answer may be found in the biological rules governing how animals typically forage for food and other rewards.

• share
• favorite_border

Our future on Earth may also be our past. In a study published Monday (Dec. 10, 2018) in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers show that humans are reversing a long-term cooling trend tracing back at least 50 million years. And it’s taken just two centuries.

• share
• favorite_border

Neurons in the brain and spinal cord don’t grow back after injury, unlike those in the rest of the body. Now, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have identified some of the key steps taken by nerves in the legs as they regenerate. The findings lay out a path that spinal cord neurons might be able to follow – potentially leading to improved recovery for people paralyzed by spinal cord injuries.