/ en-us Â鶹ÒùÔº internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Â鶹ÒùÔºics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Human noroviruses, GII.4 strains in particular, are the chief drivers of acute viral gastroenteritis around the world, a condition for which there are no vaccines or antivirals. Understanding how these viruses enter cells in the gut, a first step toward developing an infection, can lead to effective therapeutics. /news/2025-10-human-gii4-noroviruses-infecting-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Fri, 03 Oct 2025 12:10:20 EDT news678712216 Bioengineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a powerful new technology that can map the entire network of RNA-protein interactions inside human cells—an achievement that could offer new strategies for treating diseases ranging from cancer to Alzheimer's. /news/2025-10-rna-protein-chats-uncover-treatments.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 02 Oct 2025 14:51:04 EDT news678635461 It's no secret that we need new ways to treat and detect disease, including cancer. Specifically, we need better biomarkers that can be used for diagnosis and better ways to selectively get medicine where we want it to go in the body. /news/2025-10-circular-rna-preferentially-packaged-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 02 Oct 2025 12:04:05 EDT news678625441 Researchers at Integra Therapeutics, in collaboration with the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) Department of Medicine and Life Sciences (MELIS) and the Center for Genomic Regulation (CRG), have designed and experimentally validated new synthetic proteins that can edit the human genome more efficiently than proteins provided by nature. /news/2025-10-generative-ai-outperform-nature-proteins.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 02 Oct 2025 10:50:05 EDT news678620131 Researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) have successfully applied cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) to unveil the molecular structures of critical protein machines that transport lipids and maintain the outer membrane (OM) barrier of Gram-negative bacteria. /news/2025-10-cryo-em-reveals-protein-complexes.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 01 Oct 2025 15:00:02 EDT news678549389 Egg whites may be perfect for a health-conscious breakfast, but egg yolks turned out to be the key ingredient for cultivating bird embryonic stem cells (ESCs) in the lab. Using a growing medium of egg yolk along with a few other key factors, a USC Stem Cell-led team of scientists has succeeded in deriving and maintaining authentic ESCs from chickens and seven other bird species. /news/2025-09-egg-yolk-key-authentic-embryonic.html Cell & Microbiology Biotechnology Tue, 30 Sep 2025 12:07:04 EDT news678452821 Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine have developed a powerful new data analysis method named COOKIE-Pro (Covalent Occupancy Kinetic Enrichment via Proteomics) that provides a comprehensive, unbiased view of how a class of drugs, called covalent inhibitors, interacts with proteins throughout the cell. /news/2025-09-analytical-tool-optimize-potency-drugs.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Tue, 30 Sep 2025 05:00:06 EDT news678382202 A new tool greatly improves scientists' ability to identify and study proteins that regulate gene activity in cells, according to research led by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators. The technology should enable and enhance investigations in both fundamental biology and disease research. /news/2025-09-tool-proteins-gene-cells.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 29 Sep 2025 15:35:13 EDT news678378902 Cancer cells are pretty bold and clever—they hijack cellular survival and healing processes in order to fuel their growth, spread throughout the body, and ensure their own survival. The unfolded protein response, which protects cells against stress, is such a pro-survival mechanism. One of its key regulators, the inositol-requiring enzyme 1 (IRE1), has emerged as a promising target for developing therapies against cancer and a variety of other severe diseases. /news/2025-09-cancer-cells-stress-shield-compound.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Mon, 29 Sep 2025 13:00:09 EDT news678369015 The yeast fungus Candida albicans not only uses the toxin candidalysin to cause infections, but also to colonize the oral mucosa inconspicuously—but only in finely balanced amounts. Too little toxin prevents oral colonization, too much triggers the immune system and leads to an inflammatory defense reaction, as an international research team from Zurich, Jena, and Paris discovered. /news/2025-09-finely-fungal-toxin-production-albicans.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Fri, 26 Sep 2025 11:17:04 EDT news678104221 Researchers at Duke University used CRISPR technologies to discover previously unannotated stretches of DNA in the "dark genome" that are responsible for controlling how cells sense and respond to the mechanical properties of their local environment. /news/2025-09-dark-regions-genome-illuminates-cells.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Fri, 26 Sep 2025 08:57:34 EDT news678095848 An international study led by researchers from the Department of Medicine and Life Sciences (MELIS) of Pompeu Fabra University and Stanford University (California) has designed a system to identify highly selective peptides with high therapeutic potential. /news/2025-09-bacteriophages-peptides-therapeutic-potential.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Thu, 25 Sep 2025 14:24:04 EDT news678029042 For decades, gene-editing science has been limited to making small, precise edits to human DNA, akin to correcting typos in the genetic code. Arc Institute researchers are changing that paradigm with a universal gene editing system that allows for cutting and pasting of entire genomic paragraphs, rearranging whole chapters, and even restructuring entire passages of the genomic manuscript. /news/2025-09-bridge-recombinases-optimized-human-cells.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 25 Sep 2025 14:00:01 EDT news678012320 The Yale labs of Craig Roy and Jun Liu have harnessed the power of cryo-EM to solve a 30-year mystery of how the Legionella bacteria works. The findings represent the next steps in the search for new therapeutic drugs to tackle the severe form of pneumonia. /news/2025-09-3d-yale-scientists-legionnaires-disease.html Cell & Microbiology Biotechnology Thu, 25 Sep 2025 10:35:05 EDT news678015301 An Australian research team has achieved an advanced materials breakthrough that opens the door to a new generation of nanodrug applications. From drug delivery, to diagnostics, to gene editing and beyond, the breakthrough has the potential to improve outcomes for patients around the world in coming decades. /news/2025-09-lipid-nanoparticles-complex-options-generation.html Bio & Medicine Nanomaterials Tue, 23 Sep 2025 10:35:04 EDT news677842501 Missions to the moon and Mars pose nutritional challenges for astronauts. Now, a new paper on space-grown food poses nutritional challenges for astronauts, but volunteers from NASA's Open Science Data Repository Analysis Working Groups (OSDR-AWG) are working together to analyze data on astronaut health. /news/2025-09-space-grown-lettuce-falls-short.html Space Exploration Tue, 23 Sep 2025 09:32:48 EDT news677838764 Every time a eukaryotic cell divides, it faces a monumental challenge: It must carefully duplicate and divide its genetic material (chromosomes) equally, and then rebuild the nuclear envelope around the separated halves. If this process goes wrong, the resulting nuclei can be misshapen or disorganized—features often seen in cancer and aging-related diseases. /news/2025-09-key-enzyme-nucleus-formation-cell.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 23 Sep 2025 08:35:04 EDT news677835302 LC3-associated phagocytosis (LAP) is a specialized process for degrading dead cells, microbes or other particles. It plays a role in innate immunity, inflammation regulation and anticancer responses. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital scientists have, for the first time, implicated lipids in the cellular mechanism that initiates LAP. The findings, published today in Nature Cell Biology, shed light on how this process begins and its potential to influence tumor immunity. /news/2025-09-lipids-play-key-role-immune.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 22 Sep 2025 15:58:03 EDT news677775481 A novel class of light-sensitive nanoparticles may one day enable new approaches to medical imaging. They were developed by a research team at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU). The particles absorb laser light and convert them into heat, thereby changing their internal structure, similar to folded proteins. The research was published in the journal Communications Chemistry. /news/2025-09-sensitive-nanoparticles-contrast-agents-advanced.html Bio & Medicine Nanomaterials Mon, 22 Sep 2025 12:43:03 EDT news677763781 Earlier in 2025, UNSW Sydney Ph.D. candidate Christina Schmidt submitted her thesis—from the deck of Australia's multi-billion-dollar icebreaker, just off the East Antarctic coast. /news/2025-09-ice-antarctica.html Earth Sciences Environment Fri, 19 Sep 2025 10:11:29 EDT news677495482 Genetic editing holds promise to treat incurable diseases, but the most popular method—CRISPR—sometimes does more harm than good. A new study from University of California San Diego and Yale University researchers highlights an innovative alternative approach that may be safer. The study was published in Nature Chemical Biology on Sept. 18, 2025. /news/2025-09-small-nuclear-rna-base-safer.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 18 Sep 2025 09:57:04 EDT news677408222 Small but powerful: Ubiquitin controls the lifespan and distribution of proteins in the cell, but it can also determine their shape, function, or interactions with other cellular components. Ubiquitin ligases are key to this process because they reliably recognize the relevant proteins among tens of thousands of molecules and confer the correct instructions. Disruptions of this precise tagging routine can result in faulty cellular processes and diseases such as cancer. /news/2025-09-ubiquitin-ability-tag-synthetic-compounds.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 17 Sep 2025 17:10:05 EDT news677347801 A genome-editing technique known as prime editing holds potential for treating many diseases by transforming faulty genes into functional ones. However, the process carries a small chance of inserting errors that could be harmful. /news/2025-09-cas9-proteins-error-prime.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Wed, 17 Sep 2025 11:00:21 EDT news677236202 Scientists at Feinberg are reshaping scientific understanding of the cell's tiniest components—structures once thought to be static, now revealed to be dynamic engines of cellular life. As they probe the inner workings of cells, they are not only expanding understanding of cellular processes but also paving the way for novel therapies and diagnostics. /news/2025-09-scientists-reveal-hidden-dynamics-cell.html Cell & Microbiology Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 16 Sep 2025 15:00:03 EDT news677253204 To solve a problem, we have to see it clearly. Whether it's an infection by a novel virus or memory-stealing plaques forming in the brains of Alzheimer's patients, visualizing disease processes in the body is the first step toward alleviating human suffering. It's also often the most difficult and costly. /news/2025-09-source-ai-tool-aims-drug.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Tue, 16 Sep 2025 14:34:05 EDT news677252041 Inside cells there are tiny particles, known as extracellular vesicles, that store and move molecules. Our cells naturally package beneficial proteins and healing compounds into these tiny bubbles, dispatching them to where they are needed to deliver molecular cargo or to communicate with other cells. /news/2025-09-bioreactors-yield-extracellular-vesicles-medicine.html Bio & Medicine Tue, 16 Sep 2025 13:30:18 EDT news677247964 A pharmaceutical scientist at the National University of Singapore (NUS) has developed a method that can measure the kinetic efficiency of an enzyme against more than 200,000 potential peptide substrates in a single experiment. /news/2025-09-enzymatic-kinetics-substrates.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Tue, 16 Sep 2025 12:01:03 EDT news677242861 Alexander Fleming's accidental discovery of penicillin in 1928 changed the world: Once-common bacterial infections, sometimes deadly, were treatable, and a slew of antibiotics followed. But bacteria have proven a wily adversary, adapting to resist antibiotic treatment. /news/2025-09-synchrotron-rays-candidate-antibiotic-resistance.html Biotechnology Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 15 Sep 2025 13:30:03 EDT news677159873 A novel strategy developed at Rice University allows scientists to zoom in on tiny segments of proteins inside living cells, revealing localized environmental changes that could indicate the earliest stages of diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and cancer. The study, published in Nature Chemical Biology on Sept. 10, also shows promise for drug screening that targets protein aggregation diseases. /news/2025-09-fluorescent-lens-exposes-hidden-protein.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Fri, 12 Sep 2025 12:40:01 EDT news676898890 Neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Huntington's disease are characterized by the progressive loss of neurons. The resulting debilitating symptoms, such as loss of memory and cognition, and motor impairment, can significantly degrade patients' quality of life, confining them to round-the-clock care. /news/2025-09-vitamin-analogs-treatment-neurodegenerative-diseases.html Biochemistry Analytical Chemistry Fri, 12 Sep 2025 12:10:01 EDT news676897234