News aggregator

Nutrient-Regulated Antisense and Intragenic RNAs Modulate a Signal Transduction Pathway in Yeast

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
During nutritional adaptation, transcriptional activation in yeast produces noncoding RNAs that allow the formation of a positive-feedback regulatory loop.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Activator Control of Nucleosome Occupancy in Activation and Repression of Transcription

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
A new nucleosome-occupancy technique reveals how the transcriptional activator Gal4 determines chromatin structure as genes are activated and repressed.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Towards an Integrated Framework for Assessing the Vulnerability of Species to Climate Change

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Climate change is a major threat to global biodiversity. A novel integrated framework to assess vulnerability and prioritize research and management action aims to improve our ability to respond to this emerging crisis.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Identifying Neural Drivers with Functional MRI: An Electrophysiological Validation

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Neural long-range interactions can be distinguished from hemodynamic confounds in functional magnetic resonance imaging using new data analysis techniques that will allow experimental validation of models of brain function.
Categories: Biology, Journals

PKMζ Maintains Spatial, Instrumental, and Classically Conditioned Long-Term Memories

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
The persistent activity of a brain enzyme, PKMζ, stores specific associations, both unpleasant and rewarding, for places, events, and actions, and is thus a general mechanism for memory storage.
Categories: Biology, Journals

The Bacterial Symbiont Wolbachia Induces Resistance to RNA Viral Infections in Drosophila melanogaster

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Wolbachia are one of the most widespread intracellular bacteria. In Drosophila melanogaster, the presence of Wolbachia increases resistance to infection by RNA viruses.
Categories: Biology, Journals

“It's Ok, We're Not Cousins by Blood”: The Cousin Marriage Controversy in Historical Perspective

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Marriage between first cousins is highly stigmatized in the West and, indeed, is illegal in 31 US states. But is the hostility to such marriage scientifically well-grounded?
Categories: Biology, Journals

Tissue-Specific Genetic Control of Splicing: Implications for the Study of Complex Traits

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
We investigated tissue-specific genetic control of gene expression and alternative splicing in primary human cells, and we describe here the implications for understanding how genetic variation influences human disease.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Historical and Philosophical Perspectives on Contemporary Biology

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Evelyn Fox Keller introduces a new series that aims to promote productive dialogue between laboratory researchers and historians and philosophers of science to address the challenges arising from the rapid pace of biological discovery.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Animal Defenses against Infectious Agents: Is Damage Control More Important Than Pathogen Control

PLOS Biology (top articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
The ability of hosts to withstand a given number of pathogens is a critical component of health. Now playing catch-up with plant biologists, animal biologists are starting to formally separate this form of defense from classical resistance.
Categories: Biology, Journals

An Endoribonuclease Functionally Linked to Perinuclear mRNP Quality Control Associates with the Nuclear Pore Complexes

PLOS Biology (new articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
When errors in messenger RNA processing or packaging occur along the path from the site of transcription to the nuclear pore complex, the conserved RNA-degrading enzyme Swt1 comes into the game.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Collective Cell Migration Drives Morphogenesis of the Kidney Nephron

PLOS Biology (new articles) - 1 hour 27 min ago
Epithelial cell shape, tubule convolution, and segment boundary position along the kidney nephron unexpectedly involve the migration of fully differentiated epithelial cells against the flow of lumenal fluid.
Categories: Biology, Journals

Love skews your sense of smell

HIV and AIDS - 1 hour 37 min ago
Once you're in love, it gets trickier to sniff out anyone who might compete with the current object of your affections


Why bad weather is good for fisherman

HIV and AIDS - 1 hour 54 min ago
You might think fish are unaffected by winds and storms, but in fact what ends up on our dinner plates today depends on what the weather was like a few years ago


Sniff of sickness makes mums prime babies for life

HIV and AIDS - 2 hours 4 min ago
The odour of disease causes pregnant mice to boost their babies' immunity – it is the first proof that environmental cues detected by a pregnant mother can alter traits in her young


Sharpest infrared image of Milky Way's core unveiled

HIV and AIDS - 12 hours 15 min ago
The sharpest infrared picture yet taken of the roiling furnace at the galaxy's centre reveals a new population of massive stars


Darwin missed 'earliest' Galapagos species

HIV and AIDS - Mon, 2009-01-05 21:58
A bizarre-looking yet ignored species of land iguana might be one of the earliest examples of species diversification in the Galapagos


Comment: Why kids are natural-born scientists

HIV and AIDS - Mon, 2009-01-05 18:30
TV presenter asks why so many children get turned off science at school – and what we can do to rekindle their excitement


Invention: Exoskeleton power steering

HIV and AIDS - Mon, 2009-01-05 15:18
Borrowing a trick used to steer cars without effort could make robotic exoskeletons more reliable and easier to use, a patent application claims


Space experiment has a sting in the tail for newts

HIV and AIDS - Mon, 2009-01-05 13:46
Newts aren't normally fazed by having their tails chopped off – they just grow a new one – but microgravity plays havoc with the process