DURHAM, N.C. -- Duke University researchers have identified a gene that could help scientists engineer drought-resistant crops. The gene, called OSCA1, encodes a protein in the cell membrane of plants that senses changes in water availability and adjusts the plant's water conservation machinery accordingly. "It's similar to a thermostat," said Zhen-Ming Pei, an associate professor of biology at Duke. The findings, which appear Aug. 28 in the journal Nature, could make it easier to feed the world's growing population in the face of climate change. Drought is the ...

AMHERST, Mass. – Using one of the most sensitive neutrino detectors on the planet, an international team of physicists including Andrea Pocar, Laura Cadonati and doctoral student Keith Otis at the University of Massachusetts Amherst report in the current issue of Nature that for the first time they have directly detected neutrinos created by the "keystone" proton-proton (pp) fusion process going on at the sun's core. The pp reaction is the first step of a reaction sequence responsible for about 99 percent of the Sun's power, Pocar explains. Solar neutrinos are produced ...

VIDEO: Learning a new skill is easier when it is related to an ability we already have. For example, a trained pianist can learn a new melody easier than learning how... Click here for more information. PITTSBURGH—Learning a new skill is easier when it is related to an ability we already have. For example, a trained pianist can learn a new melody easier than learning how to hit a tennis serve. Scientists from the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition (CNBC) – a joint program ...

Fruit flies and roundworms have long been used as model organisms to learn more about human biology and disease. Now, researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have found that although many aspects of regulatory networks are conserved among the three distantly related organisms, other differences have emerged over evolutionary time. These differences may explain why, for example, worms slither, flies fly and humans walk on two legs, even though they all use the same basic genetic building blocks. "We're trying to understand the basic principles that ...

Although separated by hundreds of millions of years of evolution, flies, worms, and humans share ancient patterns of gene expression, according to a massive Yale-led analysis of genomic data. Two related studies led by scientists at Harvard and Stanford, also published Aug. 28 in the same issue of the journal Nature, tell a similar story: Even though humans, worms, and flies bear little obvious similarity to each other, evolution used remarkably similar molecular toolkits to shape them. However, the same Yale lab reports in a separate paper published in the Proceedings ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Most memories have some kind of emotion associated with them: Recalling the week you just spent at the beach probably makes you feel happy, while reflecting on being bullied provokes more negative feelings. A new study from MIT neuroscientists reveals the brain circuit that controls how memories become linked with positive or negative emotions. Furthermore, the researchers found that they could reverse the emotional association of specific memories by manipulating brain cells with optogenetics — a technique that uses light to control neuron activity. The ...

The genome we inherited from our parents shapes many aspects of our lives. But in addition to our genome we have an epigenome that is set during development, but can be altered by our lifestyle habits and environmental exposures—and perhaps by those of our parents and grandparents. The epigenome consists of chemical tags on our DNA and supporting proteins that determine whether genes are expressed or silenced. This means we are deeply responsible for our own health, but also that it may be possible to diagnose and treat the many diseases caused by the deregulation of ...

Recalling an emotional experience, even years later, can bring back the same intense feelings. Researchers from the RIKEN-MIT Center for Neural Circuit Genetics revealed the brain pathway that links external events to the internal emotional state, forming one memory by engaging different brain areas. The study published in the journal Nature, also demonstrates that the positive or negative emotional valence of memory can be reversed during later memory recall. The research team, led by Dr. Susumu Tonegawa, was interested in how brain structures like the hippocampus ...

Aromatic compounds are found widely in natural resources such as petroleum and biomass, and breaking the carbon?carbon bonds in these compounds plays an important role in the production of fuels and valuable chemicals from natural resources. However, aromatic carbon-carbon bonds are very stable and difficult to break. In the chemical industry, the cleavage of these bonds requires the use of solid catalysts at high temperatures, usually giving rise to a mixture of products, and the mechanisms are still poorly understood. Now, in research published in Nature, Zhaomin Hou ...

VIDEO: Polypterus senegalus walks across a sandy substrate. Fish use their fins and body in combination to move across a terrestrial substrate. Fins are planted one after the other to lift... Click here for more information. About 400 million years ago a group of fish began exploring land and evolved into tetrapods – today's amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. But just how these ancient fish used their fishy bodies and fins in a terrestrial environment and what evolutionary ...

The National Institutes of Health has issued a final NIH Genomic Data Sharing (GDS) policy to promote data sharing as a way to speed the translation of data into knowledge, products and procedures that improve health while protecting the privacy of research participants. The final policy was posted in the Federal Register Aug. 26, 2014 and published in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts Aug. 27, 2014. Starting with funding applications submitted for a Jan. 25, 2015, receipt date, the policy will apply to all NIH-funded, large-scale human and non-human projects that ...

Researchers analyzing human, fly, and worm genomes have found that these species have a number of key genomic processes in common, reflecting their shared ancestry. The findings, appearing Aug. 28, 2014, in the journal Nature, offer insights into embryonic development, gene regulation and other biological processes vital to understanding human biology and disease. The studies highlight the data generated by the modENCODE Project and the ENCODE Project, both supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health. ...

This news release is available in Spanish. Genomes accumulate changes and mutations throughout evolution. These changes have resulted in a huge diversity of species and in different traits between us. But animal cells, whether they are from a fly or a human, work similarly: they have common molecular mechanisms. Based on this premise, an international consortium with participation of scientists from the Centre for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona have compared the transcriptome (the RNA complement of a species' cell) of different animal species. They used data from ...

If ever there were a silver lining to global warming, it might be the prospect of milder winters. After all, it stands to reason that a warmer climate would generate less snow. But a new MIT study suggests that you shouldn't put your shovels away just yet. While most areas in the Northern Hemisphere will likely experience less snowfall throughout a season, the study concludes that extreme snow events will still occur, even in a future with significant warming. That means that, for example, places like Boston may see less snowy winters overall, punctuated in some years ...

By manipulating neural circuits in the brain of mice, scientists have altered the emotional associations of specific memories. The research, led by Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Susumu Tonegawa at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), reveals that the connections between the part of the brain that stores contextual information about an experience and the part of the brain that stores the emotional memory of that experience are malleable. Altering those connections can transform a negative memory into a positive one, Tonegawa and his MIT colleagues ...

Elliptical galaxies are large, gas-poor gatherings of older stars and are one of the main types of galaxy along with their spiral and lenticular relatives. Galaxy formation theories suggest that giant elliptical galaxies form from the inside out, with a large core marking the very first stages of formation. However, evidence of this early construction phase has eluded astronomers — until now. Astronomers have now spotted a compact galactic core known as GOODS-N-774, and nicknamed Sparky [1]. It is seen as it appeared eleven billion years ago, just three billion years ...

DURHAM, N.C. -- When we want to listen carefully to someone, the first thing we do is stop talking. The second thing we do is stop moving altogether. This strategy helps us hear better by preventing unwanted sounds generated by our own movements. This interplay between movement and hearing also has a counterpart deep in the brain. Indeed, indirect evidence has long suggested that the brain's motor cortex, which controls movement, somehow influences the auditory cortex, which gives rise to our conscious perception of sound. A new Duke study, appearing online August 27 ...

Two NASA satellites captured visible and infrared pictures that show the massive size of Hurricane Marie. Marie is so large that it is bringing rough surf to the southern coast of California while almost nine hundred miles west of Baja California. On August 26 at 19:05 UTC (3:05 p.m. EDT) NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Hurricane Marie drawing in the small remnants of Karina. Marie is over 400 miles in diameter, about the distance from Washington, D.C. to Boston, Massachusetts. Hurricane force winds extend outward up to 60 miles (95 km) from the center ...

LA JOLLA, CA – August 27, 2014 – Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have solved the mystery of why a specific signaling pathway can be associated with alcohol dependence. This signaling pathway is regulated by a gene, called neurofibromatosis type 1 (Nf1), which TSRI scientists found is linked with excessive drinking in mice. The new research shows Nf1 regulates gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), a neurotransmitter that lowers anxiety and increases feelings of relaxation. "This novel and seminal study provides insights into the cellular mechanisms of ...

DENVER (August 27, 2014) – Not all students returning to school this month will be up to date on their vaccinations. A new study conducted by Jennifer Reich, a researcher at the University of Colorado Denver, shows that the reasons why children may not be fully vaccinated depends on the class privilege of their mothers. According to the National Network for Immunization Information, three children per 1000 in the U.S. have never received any vaccines, with almost half of all children receiving vaccines later than recommended. The number of unvaccinated children has led ...

Many African-Americans may not be getting effective doses of the HIV drug maraviroc, a new study from Johns Hopkins suggests. The initial dosing studies, completed before the drug was licensed in 2007, included mostly European-Americans, who generally lack a protein that is key to removing maraviroc from the body. The current study shows that people with maximum levels of the protein — including nearly half of African-Americans — end up with less maraviroc in their bodies compared to those who lack the protein even when given the same dose. A simple genetic test for the ...

Learning is easier when it only requires nerve cells to rearrange existing patterns of activity than when the nerve cells have to generate new patterns, a study of monkeys has found. The scientists explored the brain's capacity to learn through recordings of electrical activity of brain cell networks. The study was partly funded by the National Institutes of Health. "We looked into the brain and may have seen why it's so hard to think outside the box," said Aaron Batista, Ph.D., an assistant professor at the University of Pittsburgh and a senior author of the study published ...

PITTSBURGH—Learning a new skill is easier when it is related to ability that we already possess. For example, a trained pianist might learn a new melody more easily than learning how to hit a tennis serve. Neural engineers from the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition (CNBC)—a joint program between the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University—have discovered a fundamental constraint in the brain that may explain why this happens. Published as the cover story in the Aug. 28, 2014, issue of Nature, they found for the first time that there are constraints ...

West Orange, NJ. August 27, 2014. Kessler Foundation scientists examined the implications for cultural diversity and cultural competence in brain injury research and rehabilitation. The article by Anthony Lequerica, PhD, and Denise Krch, PhD: Issues of cultural diversity in acquired brain injury (ABI) rehabilitation (doi:10.3233/NRE-141079) was published by Neurorehabilitation. Drs. Lequerica and Krch are research scientists in Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Research at Kessler Foundation and co-investigators for the Northern New Jersey TBI Model System. Cultural sensitivity ...

Newborn jaundice: It's one of the last things a parent wants to deal with, but it's unfortunately a common condition in babies less than a week old. Skin that turns yellow can be a sure sign that a newborn is jaundiced and isn't adequately eliminating the chemical bilirubin. But that discoloration is sometimes hard to see, and severe jaundice left untreated can harm a baby. University of Washington engineers and physicians have developed a smartphone application that checks for jaundice in newborns and can deliver results to parents and pediatricians within minutes. ...