The first comprehensive comparison of Y chromosomes from two species sheds new light on Y chromosome evolution. Contrary to a widely held scientific theory that the mammalian Y chromosome is slowly decaying or stagnating, new evidence suggests that in fact the Y is continuously reinventing itself.
U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists are part of a team that has sequenced the majority of the soybean genome, providing an unprecedented look into how this important legume crop converts four critical ingredients--sunlight, water, carbon dioxide and nitrogen--into protein and oil, the basic building blocks for many consumer products. The research team from 18 federal, state, public and private organizations published their research today in the journal Nature.
Scientists at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have found that a “longevity gene” helps to slow age-related decline in brain function in older adults. Drugs that mimic the gene’s effect are now under development, the researchers note, and could help protect against Alzheimer’s disease.
Researchers at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and colleagues have identified the first genetic variant associated with aggressive prostate cancer, proving the concept that genetic information may one day be used in combination with other factors to guide treatment decisions.
While genetics play a key role in children’s initial reading skills, a new study of twins is the first to demonstrate that environment plays an important role in reading growth over time.
Fossils may provide tantalizing clues to human history but they also lack some vital information, such as revealing which pieces of human DNA have been favored by evolution because they confer beneficial traits — resistance to infection or the ability to digest milk, for example. Now, researchers describe a method for pinpointing these preferred regions that offers greater precision and resolution than ever before, and the possibility of deeply understanding both our genetic past and present.
University of Michigan researchers have discovered the rules that dictate the three-dimensional shapes of RNA molecules, rules that are based not on complex chemical interactions but simply on geometry.
Researchers at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology in Vienna (Austria) have identified a key regulator of white versus brown adipose cell fate. The findings are reported in the January 7 issue of the journal Cell.
A canine chromosome 7 locus that confers a high risk of compulsive disorder susceptibility has been identified through a collaboration between the Behavior Service at the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, the Program in Medical Genetics at the University of Massachusetts Medical School and the Broad Institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The findings are published in the January 2010 edition of Nature Molecular Psychiatry.
Scientists at the University of Idaho have discovered not only that different species sometimes use the same gene to produce the same adaptation, but also that how they use it can lead to different outcomes.
Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine say a recent discovery suggests that inherited genetic variations exist between whites and blacks living in the U.S., leading to less efficient metabolism of glucose and predisposition to diabetes in blacks.
A team of Columbia scientists have discovered two genes that, when simultaneously activated, are responsible for the most aggressive forms of human brain cancer. This finding was made possible by the assembly of the first comprehensive network of molecular interactions that determine the behavior of these cancer cells.
Nationwide Children’s Hospital recently was awarded an initial $5.5 million contract from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to serve as a Biospecimen Core Resource (BCR) for The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), a program co-managed by the NCI and the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), both part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
A Chicago research team is one year into a three-year project to collect and analyze the genetic sequence and variations of every gene expressed by 1,000 tumors with a long-term goal of translating genomic discoveries into diagnostic tools and therapeutic strategies.
A group of Norwegian and American researchers have shown that common variations in genes associated with microcephaly – a neuro-developmental disorder in which brain size is dramatically reduced – may explain differences in brain size in healthy individuals as well as in patients with neurological and psychiatric disorders.
Researchers from the UC San Diego, School of Medicine and colleagues have identified a new gene, ETS-1, that is linked to human congenital heart defects. The landmark study, recently published online in the journal of Human Molecular Genetics, provides important insights into some of the most prevalent forms of congenital heart defects in humans.
The most widely used human embryonic stem cell lines lack genetic diversity, a finding that raises social justice questions that must be addressed to ensure that all sectors of society benefit from stem cell advances, according to a University of Michigan research team.
DNA replication is a basic function of living organisms, allowing cells to divide and multiply, all while maintaining the genetic code and proper function of the original cell. The process, or mechanism, by which this is accomplished presents many challenges as the double helical (coil-shaped) DNA divides into two strands that are duplicated by different methods, yet both strands complete the replication at the same time. New research by a team from UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in conjunction with the University of Illinois and published in the Dec. 17 issue of Nature, has addressed this fundamental problem. The study identifies three essential ways the synthesis of the two strands is coordinated by enzymes, settling scientific deliberations on how the two DNA strands are copied in the same time span.
Aided by next-generation DNA sequencing technology, an international team of researchers has gained insights into how more than 60 carcinogens associated with cigarette smoke bind to and chemically modify human DNA, ultimately leading to cancer-causing genetic mutations.
Genes that don’t themselves directly affect the inherited characteristics of an organism but leave them increasingly open to variation may be a significant driving force of evolution, say two Johns Hopkins scientists.
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