Eukaryotes News and Research

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Scientists discover how DNA mismatch repair proteins work

In eukaryotes - the group of organisms that include humans - a key to survival is the ability of certain proteins to quickly and accurately repair genetic errors that occur when DNA is replicated to make new cells.

23 Dec 2011

Ribosomes spontaneously change their form during protein production

Ribosomes, the construction sites for proteins, are far more complex than previously assumed. During the production of proteins they constantly and spontaneously change their form. This performance of eukaryotic ribosomes has now been demonstrated for the first time by scientists at Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, the Max-Planck-Institut für Molekulare Genetik in Berlin, and Cornell University in New York, with the aid of special electron microscopic and biophysical methods.

24 Nov 2011

DFG to form new collaborative research centers as of 1 July 2011

The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) will establish 21 new Collaborative Research Centres (CRCs) as of 1 July 2011. This was decided by the relevant Grants Committee at its spring meeting in Bonn.

4 Jun 2011

Study analyzes role of PARP enzyme in eukaryotes

An Ohio State University molecular biologist leveraged a supercomputer to help better define the family tree of a group of enzymes that have been implicated in a wide range of human diseases and are important targets for anti-cancer therapies.

8 Mar 2011

New approaches for controlling sleeping sickness caused by trypanosomes

The research could eventually lead to new approaches for controlling sleeping sickness in humans and wasting diseases in livestock which are caused by trypanosomes carried by the bloodsucking tsetse fly.

18 Feb 2011

New study on mosquito genome sequences to identify 'transposable elements'

A team of scientists at the University of California, Riverside has begun working on a mosquito research project that, if successful, will provide valuable genetic resources capable of transforming the way mosquito research is conducted around the world.

14 Feb 2011

Novel study finds unexpected link between reproductive proteins in humans, invertebrates

A novel study in the scientific journal Molecular Biology and Evolution draws a completely unexpected link between reproductive proteins in humans and proteins involved in fertilization in invertebrates, as well as mating between haploid cells in yeast. Because human and yeast are separated by 1 billion years of evolution, these findings may have important implications for our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying sex, and how they originated.

5 Feb 2011

ISU researchers study parasites that cause NTDs in humans

Richard Martin, DVM, PhD, a biomedical sciences professor at Iowa State University's College of Veterinary Medicine, has devoted his 35-year career to studying nematode parasites. These parasites infect approximately one-quarter of the world population, producing debilitating symptoms that devastate the lives and economies of many of the world's underdeveloped and impoverished areas.

29 Jan 2011

Cell quality control mechanism research paves way for new understanding of neurodegenerative diseases

Scientists from The Scripps Research Institute have solved a long-standing mystery of how cells conduct "quality control" to eliminate the toxic effects of a certain kind of error in protein production. The findings may lead to a better understanding of a host of neurodegenerative diseases.

13 Sep 2010

Protein acetylation not rare in bacteria

Lowly bacteria are turning out to be much more complex than previously thought.

13 Jul 2010

NSF Faculty Early Career Development Award for Zhihao Zhuang

Zhihao Zhuang, assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Delaware, has won the National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development Award.

17 Apr 2010

Gene duplications can lead to functional diversity in organisms

New information about early Native Americans' horticultural practices comes not from hieroglyphs or other artifacts, but from a suite of four gene duplicates found in wild and domesticated sunflowers.

5 Apr 2010

Mechanism by which Plasmodium replicates itself in human blood to spread disease identified

Malaria remains one of the most deadly infectious diseases. Yet, how Plasmodium, the malaria parasite, regulates its infectious cycle has remained an enigma despite decades of rigorous research.

19 Feb 2010

Biochemists identify a critical piece in the evolutionary puzzle

Monash University biochemists have found a critical piece in the evolutionary puzzle that explains how life on Earth evolved millions of centuries ago.

6 Feb 2010

Scientists discover a new family of giant virus

After Mimivirus, Mamavirus and the virophage, the group of giant viruses now has a new member called Marseillevirus. Discovered in an amoeba by the team led by Didier Raoult at the Unité de Recherche sur les Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Emergentes research group (CNRS/Université Aix-Marseille 2), a description of this new virus was published this week on the website of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

31 Dec 2009

Scientists provide the first comprehensive picture of minimal cell

What are the bare essentials of life, the indispensable ingredients required to produce a cell that can survive on its own? Can we describe the molecular anatomy of a cell, and understand how an entire organism functions as a system? These are just some of the questions that scientists in a partnership between the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the Centre de Regulacio Genòmica (CRG) in Barcelona, Spain, set out to address.

28 Nov 2009

Researchers uncover atomic-level action of ring-shaped protein motors

The atomic-level action of a remarkable class of ring-shaped protein motors has been uncovered by researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) using a state-of-the-art protein crystallography beamline at the Advanced Light Source (ALS).

25 Nov 2009

New RNA repair and modification system in bacteria discovered

In new papers appearing this month in Science and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, University of Illinois biochemistry professor Raven H. Huang and his colleagues describe the first RNA repair system to be discovered in bacteria.

13 Oct 2009

Chk1 and Fbx6 play an important role for the regulation of response to chemotherapy

Cell cycle checkpoints act like molecular tripwires for damaged cells, forcing them to pause and take stock. Leave the tripwire in place for too long, though, and cancer cells will press on regardless, making them resistant to the lethal effects of certain types of chemotherapy, according to researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.

28 Aug 2009

Surprising new insights into the repair strategies of DNA

A microscopic single-celled organism, adapted to survive in some of the harshest environments on earth, could help scientists gain a better understanding of how cancer cells behave.

15 Jul 2009