Ribosomal RNA (rRNA) News and Research

RSS

One secret to how tuberculosis resists the host immune system

Mycobacterium tuberculosis is arguably the world's most successful infectious agent because it knows how to avoid elimination by slowing its own growth to a crawl. Now, a report in the July 10 issue of the journal Cell, a Cell Press publication, offers new insight into the bugs' talent for meager living.

9 Jul 2009

Antibiotics diminish diversity of helpful gutmicrobes

It's common knowledge that a protective navy of bacteria normally floats in our intestinal tracts. Antibiotics at least temporarily disturb the normal balance. But it's unclear which antibiotics are the most disruptive, and if the full array of "good bacteria" return promptly or remain altered for some time.

18 Jun 2009

Genomic research lays groundwork for new approaches for treating, preventing skin diseases

The health of our skin - one of the body's first lines of defense against illness and injury - depends upon the delicate balance between our own cells and the millions of bacteria and other one-celled microbes that live on its surface.

28 May 2009

Microbes within gut may hold key to one cause of obesity

In terms of diversity and sheer numbers, the microbes occupying the human gut easily dwarf the billions of people inhabiting the Earth.

19 Jan 2009

Biologist finds plant polymerases IV and V are really variants of polymerase II

It's a little like finding out that Superman is actually Clark Kent. A team of biologists at Washington University in St. Louis has discovered that two vital cellular components, nuclear RNA Polymerases IV and V (Pol IV and V), found only in plants, are actually specialized forms of RNA Polymerase II, an essential enzyme of all eukaryotic organisms, including humans.

6 Jan 2009

Bacteria discovered in amniotic fluids of women who undergo preterm birth

Researchers from Case Western Reserve University and Yale University have made a significant advancement in understanding the cause behind why some pregnant women suffer from inflammations in the inner womb without any signs of an infection.

6 Jan 2009

Breakthrough in understanding the phenomenon of nucleolar dominance

Since the machinery involved in nucleolar dominance is some of the same machinery that can go haywire in diseases such as cancer, Pikaard and his collaborators' research may have important implications for applied medical research.

5 Dec 2008

Discovery of new species of bacterium that causes leprosy

A new species of bacterium that causes leprosy has been identified through intensive genetic analysis of a pair of lethal infections, a research team reports in the December issue of the American Journal of Clinical Pathology.

24 Nov 2008

Antibiotics can cause pervasive, persistant changes to microbiota in human gut

Using a novel technique developed by Mitchell Sogin of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) to identify different types of bacteria, scientists have completed the most precise survey to date of how microbial communities in the human gut respond to antibiotic treatment.

18 Nov 2008

Infections of amniotic fluid may be a significant cause of premature birth

Previously unrecognized and unidentified infections of amniotic fluid may be a significant cause of premature birth, according to researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

25 Aug 2008

Evolution in the ribosome

A new study of the ribosome, the cell's protein-building machinery, sheds light on the oldest branches of the evolutionary tree of life and suggests that differences in ribosomal structure between the three main branches of that tree are "molecular fossils" of the early evolution of protein synthesis.

18 Aug 2008

NCI scientists visualize gene regulation in living cells

A research team led by scientists at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has applied advanced imaging methods and computer simulations to be able to glance at the regulation of a cancer-related gene in a living cell. They found that the efficiency with which the components of the cell's gene reading machinery come together has an impact on gene expression, the process by which a gene translates its information into a new protein. The findings, published in the May 23, 2008 issue of Molecular Cell, shed new light on the means by which living cells regulate gene activity.

22 May 2008

Suicide victims who were abused have genetic brain difference

Canadian researchers have found that childhood abuse victims who later commit suicide have marked genetic differences in their brains.

7 May 2008

First comprehensive database of microorganisms known to live in the mouth

Scientists know more today than ever before about the microbes that inhabit our mouths.

26 Mar 2008

New Cockayne syndrome discovery

Scientists of the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum, DKFZ) have shown that the genetic defect that causes Cockayne Syndrome affects a key function of the cell – the transcription of genes coding for ribosomal RNA.

21 Aug 2007

Researchers identify new keys to regulation of bacterial gene expression

The cellular process of transcription, in which the enzyme RNA polymerase constructs chains of RNA from information contained in DNA, depends upon previously underappreciated sections of both the DNA promoter region and RNA polymerase

18 Jun 2006

Genetic testing can improve newborn screening tests for hearing defects

Researchers have identified several changes that could be made to existing newborn screening tests for hearing defects that could advance the standard of care in detecting deaf infants, according to an article in the New England Journal of Medicine.

17 May 2006

"Junk" RNA regulates important cellular processes

It has been known for a long time that much of a cell’s RNA stems from DNA regions called intergenic spacers (IGS) that lie between two genes and do not code for proteins.

9 May 2006

Gene silencing protein discovered

A team of researchers, including biologists at Washington University in St. Louis, has discovered the key role one protein plays in a major turn-off -in this case, the turning off of thousands of nearly identical genes in a hybrid plant.

8 May 2006

Intracellular observation of RNA metabolism will help identify disease-associated RNAs

For the first time, researchers can now peer inside intact cells to not only identify RNA-binding proteins, but also observe-in real-time-the intricate activities of these special molecules that make them key players in managing some of the cell's most basic functions.

7 Feb 2006