Category Biology/Biotechnology

Electron microscope image of M13 spheroid-templated spiky gold nanobead with corresponding graphical illustration. Credit: Haberer Lab, UC Riverside

Engineers at the University of California, Riverside, have altered a virus to arrange gold atoms into spheroids measuring a few nanometers in diameter. The finding could make production of some electronic components cheaper, easier, and faster. “Nature has been assembling complex, highly organized nanostructures for millennia with precision and specificity far superior to the most advanced technological approaches,” said Elaine Haberer, a professor of electrical and computer engineering in UCR’s Marlin and Rosemary Bourns College of Engineering and senior author of the paper describing the breakthrough...

Greg Van Stavern, MD, (seated) and Rajendra Apte, MD, PhD, examine Kathleen Eisterhold’s eyes, using technology that one day may make it possible to screen patients for Alzheimer’s disease during an eye exam. In a small study, the eye test was able to detect the presence of Alzheimer’s damage in older patients with no symptoms of the disease.
Credit: Matt Miller

Noninvasive test may screen for disease before symptoms appear. It may be possible in the future to screen patients for Alzheimer’s disease using an eye exam. Using technology similar to what is found in many eye doctors’ offices, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have detected evidence suggesting Alzheimer’s in older patients who had no symptoms of the disease.

Their study, involving 30 patients, ...

Self-healing reverse filter allows large particles through, but excludes smaller particles and gases.
Credit: Tak-Sing Wong/Birgitt Boschitsch, Penn State

A self-healing membrane that acts as a reverse filter, blocking small particles and letting large ones through, is the “straight out of science fiction” work of a team of Penn State mechanical engineers. “Conventional filters, like those used to make coffee, allow small objects to pass through while keeping larger objects contained,” said Birgitt Boschitsch, graduate student in mechanical engineering.

She and the research team, however, developed the exact opposite, a stabilized liquid material that screens out smaller objects while allowing larger ones to pass through.
The team experimented with liquids for their unique properties...

Divergent effects of resistance and endurance exercise on plasma bile acids, FGF19, and FGF21 in humans

Strength training and cardio exercise affect the body differently with regard to the types of hormones they release into the blood, new research shows. In a new study published in the scientific Journal of Clinical Investigation – Insight, the researchers show that cardio training on an exercise bike causes 3X as large an increase in the production of the hormone FGF21 than strength training with weights. FGF21 has a lot of positive effects on metabolism.

‘Of course it is very exciting for us researchers to see how different forms of physical activity actually affect the body differently...