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Though tiny, the freshwater Hydra has regenerative abilities more impressive than those of its namesake, the nine-headed monster of Greek legend. Both the real Hydra and the mythical Hydra can undergo morphallaxis—tissue regeneration—when body parts are injured or severed. But the real Hydra has an extra trick up its sleeve, or down its collar. TheRead more

    Horizontal gene transfer, the scientific moniker for bacterial sex, is a fundamental part of microbial evolution, as it allows key genetic loci, such as antibiotic resistance, to spread through diverse microbial communities. However, since the event is relatively infrequent, scientists have often wondered why gene transfer events have been able to exert such strong effects.Read more

    Scientists have developed a new injectable ‘biogel’ that can effectively deliver anti-cancer agents directly into cancerous tumours and kill them.  The technology, developed by researchers at the University of Montreal Hospital Research Centre (CRCHUM), has already been successfully tested in the laboratory.  The injectable biogel is liquid at room temperature and solidifies at 37°C—human bodyRead more

    A researcher at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory thinks she might have found a solution to transporting therapeutics across the blood-brain barrier to treat a deadly form of brain cancer. Ting Xu, Ph.D., a polymer scientist, who specializes in self-assembling bio/nano hybrid materials, has developed a new family of nanocarriers formed from the self-assembly of amphiphilicRead more

    A new gene has been discovered that allows bacteria to become resistant to our last line of antibiotic defense. The gene, MCR-1, was found to be widespread in pigs and patients in south China, with some strains having epidemic potential.  MCR-1 was found to enable bacteria to become resistant to polymyxins; the colistin and polymyxinRead more

    Researchers at the Institute of Molecular Biology (IMB) in Mainz, Germany say they have unraveled a complex regulatory mechanism that explains how a single gene can drive the formation of brain cells. Their study (“NeuroD1 reprograms chromatin and transcription factor landscapes to induce the neuronal program”), published in The EMBO Journal, is an important stepRead more

In just the past few years, researchers have found a way to use a naturally occurring bacterial system known as CRISPR/Cas9 to inactivate or correct specific genes in any organism. CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing activity runs continuously, though, leading to risk of additional editing at unwanted sites. Now, researchers at University of California, San Diego SchoolRead more

    The role of microRNAs in the detection of various types of cancer has become increasingly evident over the past several years. However, a major drawback of using these molecules as a diagnostic indicator of disease has been developing a method that is sensitive enough to detect minuscule amounts of the genetic material in a timeframeRead more

    Researchers from the Florida campus of the Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) say they have discovered several first-in-class compounds that target inactive Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria that hide inside cell aggregates, latent and persistent, waiting to break out. The researchers described a technique in ACS Chemical Biology (“First-in-Class Inhibitors of Sulfur Metabolism with Bactericidal Activity against Non-ReplicatingRead more

    Scientists from the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montreal (IRCM) led by André Veillette, M.D., have identified the mechanism of action for a new target for novel immune-oncology treatments. Their discovery (“DNAM-1 controls NK cell activation via an ITT-like motif”) is described in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.     The researchers study natural killer (NK) cells,Read more