Caenorhabditis elegans News and Research

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Caenorhabditis elegans is a free-living, transparent nematode (roundworm), about 1 mm in length, which lives in temperate soil environments.

Study offers new neurological explanation for variability in roundworm's brain activity

Even worms have free will. If offered a delicious smell, for example, a roundworm will usually stop its wandering to investigate the source, but sometimes it won't. Just as with humans, the same stimulus does not always provoke the same response, even from the same individual. New research at Rockefeller University, published online today (March 12) in Cell, offers a new neurological explanation for this variability, derived by studying a simple three-cell network within the roundworm brain.

18 Mar 2015

Andor Zyla sCMOS Camera enables instantaneous imaging of neuronal activity across whole organism for the first time

The speed, resolution and sensitivity of the Andor Zyla sCMOS camera has allowed the Vaziri research group in Vienna, Austria, to simultaneously image neuronal activity across an entire organism for the first time.

10 Feb 2015

Parents can pass silenced genes to offspring through a specific mechanism

For more than a century, scientists have understood the basics of inheritance: if good genes help parents survive and reproduce, the parents pass those genes along to their offspring. And yet, recent research has shown that reality is much more complex: genes can be switched off, or silenced, in response to the environment or other factors, and sometimes these changes can be passed from one generation to the next.

4 Feb 2015

New study identifies three genes that enable glioblastoma to recur, progress after radiation therapy

A new study identifies three genes that together enable a lethal form of brain cancer to recur and progress after radiation therapy.

4 Feb 2015

Researchers find CREB-activated genes in long-term memory-trained worms

A new study has identified genes involved in long-term memory in the worm as part of research aimed at finding ways to retain cognitive abilities during aging.

23 Jan 2015

Four UCLA researchers receive NIH Director's New Innovator Award

Four scientists from the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have received a National Institutes of Health Director's New Innovator Award that will forward revolutionary stem cell and neuro-science in medicine.

12 Oct 2014

USC scientists find new way to suppress obesity

Imagine being able to take a pill that lets you eat all of the ice cream, cookies, and cakes that you wanted – without gaining any weight.

7 Oct 2014

Researchers hope to find new ways to combat age-related diseases

Through the study of the roundworm, Caenorhabditis elegans, the team led by Hugo Aguilaniu has discovered a hormone that enhances longevity and reduces fertility, thus reproducing the effects of an extreme diet.

11 Sep 2014

Flow through pain-sensing molecule helps worms adapt to pain

When you accidentally touch a hot oven, you rapidly pull your hand away. Although scientists know the basic neural circuits involved in sensing and responding to such painful stimuli, they are still sorting out the molecular players.

2 Sep 2014

Deadly neurodegenerative disease treated in worms gives hope for humans

An untreatable and deadly neurodegenerative disease has been modelled and treated in worms by University of Liverpool researchers, suggesting a cure could be found for humans.

17 Jul 2014

CNIOA researchers update number of human genes to 19,000

How nutrients are metabolised and how neurons communicate in the brain are just some of the messages coded by the 3 billion letters that make up the human genome.

4 Jul 2014

GENETICS and G3: Genes|Genomes|Genetics publish special collection on genetics of immunity

Immunity is what stops you dying from a common cold or a tiny pinprick. Differences in resistance or tolerance to disease influence who catches the bug that's going around the office, or which species succumb to the deadly fungus devastating frogs around the world.

18 Jun 2014

Metformin drug slows ageing and increases lifespan

A study by Belgian doctoral researcher Wouter De Haes (KU Leuven) and colleagues provides new evidence that metformin, the world's most widely used anti-diabetic drug, slows ageing and increases lifespan.

3 Jun 2014

Researchers develop imaging system that reveals neural activity throughout brains of living animals

Researchers at MIT and the University of Vienna have created an imaging system that reveals neural activity throughout the brains of living animals.

19 May 2014

Researchers identify new molecular circuit that controls longevity in yeast and complex organisms

Ancient philosophers looked to alchemy for clues to life everlasting. Today, researchers look to their yeast.

9 May 2014

Researchers identify protein that regulates how genetic information transcribed from DNA to mRNA

Molecular biologists from Indiana University are part of a team that has identified a protein that regulates the information present in a large number of messenger ribonucleic acid molecules that are important for carrying genetic information from DNA to protein synthesis.

7 Feb 2014

Drug used to treat schizophrenia, dementia has potential for treating liver disease

Opening up a can of worms is a good way to start hunting for new drugs, recommend researchers from Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

4 Feb 2014

Researchers find huge diversity in how different organisms age

In our youth we are strong and healthy and then we weaken and die - that's probably how most would describe what ageing is all about. But, in nature, the phenomenon of ageing shows an unexpected diversity of patterns and is altogether rather strange, conclude researchers from The University of Southern Denmark.

9 Dec 2013

Male roundworms shorten the lifespan of females, say Stanford researchers

Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have discovered that males of the laboratory roundworm secrete signaling molecules that significantly shorten the lifespan of the opposite sex.

29 Nov 2013

Vitamin pills can do more harm than good

Vitamin supplements are a billion-dollar industry. We want to stay healthy and fit and help our bodies with this. But perhaps we are achieving precisely the opposite?

26 Nov 2013