In humans, the length of pre-mRNA varies extensively (from 30 to 1,160,411 nucleotides by recent studies). The fundamental mechanism of splicing has been studied with model pre-mRNAs including 158- and 231-nt introns, for historical instance, that are spliced very efficiently in vitro and in vivo. Such an ideal pre-mRNA contains good splicing signal sequences, i.e., the 5′ splice site, the branch-site (BS) sequence, and the polypyrimidine tract (PPT) followed by the 3′ splice site that are recognized by U1 snRNP, U2 snRNP and U2AF2–U2AF1, respectively. Prof. Mayeda says, “Given the diverse lengths ...

Corals searching for food in the cold and dark waters of the deep sea are building higher and higher mountains to get closer to the source of their food. But in doing so, they may find themselves trapped when the climate changes. That is shown in the thesis that theoretical ecologist Anna van der Kaaden of NIOZ in Yerseke and the Copernicus Institute for Sustainable Development in Utrecht will defend on Feb. 20 at the University of Groningen. “When the water gets warmer, these creatures prefer to be deeper, but a coral doesn’t just walk down the mountain,” Van der Kaaden said. Deep and dark Unlike the famous, colorful tropical corals, cold-water corals live ...

Surgeons who routinely change surgical gloves and instruments are incurring similar costs to those using the same equipment, a new study has found. The economic evaluation funded by the UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) follows a clinical trial conducted at 80 hospitals in Benin, Ghana, India, Mexico, Nigeria, Rwanda, and South Africa which established that routine change of gloves and instruments reduces surgical site infections (SSIs) by 13%. The evaluation, published by the Lancet Global ...

Scientists have long thought of the fluid-filled sac around our lungs merely as a cushion from external damage. Turns out, it also houses potent virus-eating cells that rush into the lungs during flu infections. Not to be confused with phages, which are viruses that infect bacteria, these cells are macrophages, immune cells produced in the body.  “The name macrophage means ‘big eater.’ They gobble up bacteria, viruses, cancer cells, and dying cells. Really, anything that looks foreign, they take it up and destroy it,” said UC Riverside virologist Juliet Morrison, who led the discovery team. “We were surprised to find them in the lungs ...

USC, together with Leonard and his late wife Pamela Schaeffer, is launching a new institute with a $59 million gift from the Schaeffers to be anchored in Los Angeles and in the university’s new Capital Campus in Washington, D.C. The mission of the Leonard D. Schaeffer Institute for Public Policy & Government Service is to strengthen democracy by training generations of public leaders and advancing evidence-based research to shape policy that addresses the nation’s most pressing issues, USC President Carol Folt announced ...

  ANN ARBOR—Using social media data and artificial intelligence in a comprehensive national assessment, a new University of Michigan study reveals that nearly 15% of Americans deny that climate change is real. Scientists have long warned that a warming climate will cause communities around the globe to face increasing risks due to unprecedented levels of flooding, wildfires, heat stress, sea-level rise and more. Though the science is sound—even showing that human-induced, climate-related natural disasters are growing in frequency ...

Red nets are better at keeping away a common agricultural insect pest than typical black or white nets, according to a new study. Researchers experimented with the effect of red, white, black and combination-colored nets on deterring onion thrips from eating Kujo leeks, also called Welsh onions. In both lab and field tests, red nets were significantly better at deterring the insect than other colors. Also, in field tests, onion crops which were either partially or fully covered by red netting required 25-50% less insecticide than was needed for a totally uncovered field. Changing agricultural nets from black or white to red could help reduce pesticide ...

A new artificial intelligence (AI) tool that draws logical inferences about the function of unknown proteins promises to help scientists unravel the inner workings of the cell. Developed by KAUST bioinformatics researcher Maxat Kulmanov and colleagues, the tool outperforms existing analytical methods for forecasting protein functions and is even able to analyze proteins with no clear matches in existing datasets[1].   The model, termed DeepGO-SE, takes advantage of large language models similar to those ...

A research paper published today (14 February 2024) in Nature Cancer details new insights into the role of efferocytosis – the burying of dead cells – in pancreatic cancer that spreads to the liver. Liver metastasis occurs in 40–50% of people with pancreatic ductal adenosarcoma (PDAC), and there are currently no effective therapies to cure pancreatic cancer patients that have liver metastasis. Led by University of Liverpool’s Professor Michael Schmid and colleagues, this study found PDAC metastases to show high levels of immunosuppressive macrophages, a type of white blood ...

Fear and addiction exert significant influence within society. Managing them is often challenging, as they are driven by intricate neuronal circuits in our brains. Understanding the underlying molecular mechanisms is crucial to intervene when these processes malfunction. Pioneered by scientists at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), the novel “Flash and Freeze-fracture” technique provides a unique glimpse into the respective brain region. The results were recently published in the journal PNAS. While looking for food, a bird encounters a fox. It gets away just in time, but the sight ...

In the dark and cold of the months-long polar night, food resources are limited. Some groups of marine organisms in the polar regions overcome this challenge by going into a metabolic resting state in winter, surviving on reserves accumulated during the short growth season. But others, such as several species of marine zooplankton, have evolved a different strategy: they shift from a specialized to an omnivorous diet during the polar night, profiting from a wide range of potentially less rewarding foods that are available throughout the year. Now, ...

Elche (Spain), January 22, 2024. Usually, show business depicts viruses, bacteria, and other microorganisms as one of the worst menaces to humankind. Entertainment movies influence the way audiences understand and perceive these topics. Yet, few films accurately portray the science of microbiology and its social implications. Movies and TV series often feature outbreaks of deadly diseases and the efforts of scientists and medical professionals to contain them. However, entertainment movies can also educate the public about the importance and the impact ...

The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) announced that Dr. Maesoon Im of the Brain Science Institute, together with Prof. Seung Ja Oh of Kyung Hee University and Prof. Kangwon Lee of Seoul National University, successfully incorporated anti-inflammatory drugs into a hydrogel to suppress inflammation in the retina and effectively deliver the drugs to the inflamed area. Age-related macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa are incurable eye diseases that cause blindness due to the gradual damage of photoreceptor cells, which convert light into biological signals in the retina, the light-sensitive tissue at the back of the eye. Age-related macular degeneration is a condition ...

For middle-aged women plagued by migraines, or hot flashes and night sweats, another worry may linger in the backs of their minds: whether these experiences have set them up for a heart attack, a stroke or another cardiovascular crisis. After all, past research suggesting such a link during and after menopause has gotten a lot of attention. But a pair of new studies in the journal Menopause suggest that most of them don’t need to worry as much, especially if they don’t have both migraines and long-term hot flashes and night sweats. Instead, they should focus on tackling the ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (Feb 14, 2024)—Hot flashes and migraine (particularly with aura) have been shown to be individual risk factors for cardiovascular disease because of associated poorer heart disease riskfactor profiles. A new study, however, is the first to examine the joint influences of migraine and hot flashes/night sweats (vasomotor symptoms) independent of traditional heart disease risk factors and estrogen use. Research results are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The Menopause Society.   Specifically, ...

A course of acupuncture may curb the heightened risk of stroke associated with rheumatoid arthritis, finds a comparative study published in the open access journal BMJ Open.   The effects seem to be independent of sex, age, medication use, and co-existing conditions, the findings indicate, prompting the researchers to suggest that the procedure may reduce levels of pro-inflammatory proteins (cytokines) in the body that are linked to cardiovascular disease. The principal cause of death in people with rheumatoid arthritis is cardiovascular disease. And they are more likely to have a stroke than ...

The quality of evidence submitted to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) for informing its decisions to recommend technologies for use in the NHS was poor in more than half of cases, reveals a 20-year analysis, published in the open access journal BMJ Open.   And the data quality submitted for health technology appraisals by manufacturers between 2000 and 2019 was consistently poor, with no improvement during that time, the analysis shows. NICE advises the NHS on the ...

A range of reproductive factors, including age when periods first start and an early menopause, are all linked to a heightened risk of COPD—the umbrella term for progressive lung conditions that cause breathing difficulties—finds research published online in the journal Thorax. Miscarriage, stillbirth, infertility, and having 3 or more children are also associated with a heightened risk of COPD, which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis, the findings show. Recent evidence indicates substantial gender  differences in susceptibility ...

Psychological distress increased among people with Black Caribbean heritage in the UK, relative to the White population, following the 2014 Immigration Act and the Windrush scandal, finds a new study led by UCL researchers. The researchers say their findings, published in The Lancet Psychiatry, suggest a causal link between government policies and a subsequent decline in mental health. They were investigating the impact of the Immigration Act 2014, requiring landlords, employers, the NHS, banks and the police to check right-to-stay documentation. This was a key part of a set of measures known as the Home Office hostile environment policy, seeking ...

A drug used to treat rheumatoid arthritis could also prevent the disease in individuals deemed to be at risk. Results from a Phase 2b clinical trial, published today in The Lancet by researchers led by King’s College London, provides hope for arthritis sufferers after it was shown that the biologic drug abatacept reduces progression to this agonising chronic inflammatory disease. Rheumatoid arthritis affects half a million people in the UK and develops when the body’s immune system attacks itself, causing joint pain, swelling and significant disability. The disease most commonly begins in middle age, but much younger age groups can be afflicted, and until ...

Babies playfully tease others as young as eight months of age. Since language is not required for this behavior, similar kinds of playful teasing might be present in non-human animals. Now cognitive biologists and primatologists from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA, US), the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior (MPI-AB, Germany), Indiana University (IU, US), and the University of California San Diego (UCSD, US) have documented playful teasing in four species of great apes. Like joking behavior in humans, ape teasing is provocative, persistent, and includes elements of surprise and play. Because all four great ape species used playful teasing, it is likely that the ...

A therapist-guided digital cognitive behavioural therapy reduced distress in 89 per cent of participants living with long-term physical health conditions, a new King’s College London study finds. Researchers at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London found that people living with long-term conditions who received the therapist-guided digital programme called COMPASS showed a significant reduction in psychological distress (a combined score of anxiety and depression) 12-weeks after starting the study.  194 patients were recruited via long-term condition charities, including Crohn’s & ...

For the first time, Purdue researchers prove that measuring mechanical motions in living cancer tissues is a viable and promising approach for predicting chemoresistance Chemotherapy can save lives, but often a cancer patient may be resistant to their prescribed chemotherapy, which costs the patient valuable time. Chemoresistance is a topic that researchers need to understand better so that they can match the right type of chemo to the right patient, which is called personalized medicine. An unusual pairing of veterinary scientists and physicists believe ...

CORNELL UNIVERSITY MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE FOR RELEASE: Feb. 13, 2024 Kaitlyn Serrao 607-882-1140 kms465@cornell.edu Trail cameras track ‘critically low’ New York bobcat population ITHACA, N.Y. – With thousands of strategically placed cameras covering more than 27,000 square miles in central and western New York, biologists have evidence that bobcat populations remain critically low in central and western New York state. Despite reports of recent recoveries elsewhere, bobcat populations in New York State displayed low occupancy, ...

Living organisms often create what is needed for life from scratch. For humans, this process means the creation of most essential compounds needed to survive. But not every living thing has this capability, such as the parasite that causes malaria, which affected an estimated 249 million people in 2022. Virginia Tech researchers in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences found that by preventing the malaria parasite from scavenging fatty acids, a type of required nutrient, it could no longer grow. “The key to this breakthrough is that we were able to develop a screening method for the malaria ...