Category Biology/Biotechnology

Mice were exposed to two auditory fear conditioning, separated by five hours. Both memories were encoded by shared neurons in the lateral amygdala while they were encoded by different neurons in the auditory cortex. Mice showed freezing behavior in response to 7kHz and 2kHz tones. Induction of optical long term depotentiation (LTD) to synapses specific to 7kHz fear memory, erased only that memory (test 3) without affecting the other memory (test 4) that was stored in shared neuron ensemble.
Credit: Kaoru Inokuchi, Kareem Abdou

Memories are formed through long-term changes in synaptic efficacy, a process known as synaptic plasticity, and are stored in the brain in specific neuronal ensembles called engram cells, which are activated during corresponding events...

Spontaneous spikes being similar to nerve impulses of neurons was generated from a POM/CNT complexed network. Credit: Osaka University

Molecular/carbon nanotube network devices enable artificial spiking neurons that mimic nerve impulse generation. Researchers have created extremely dense, random SWNT/ POM network molecular neuromorphic devices, generating spontaneous spikes similar to nerve impulses of neurons. They conducted simulation calculations of the random molecular network model complexed with POM molecules, which are able to store electric charges, replicating spikes generated from ] random molecular network. They also demonstrated that this molecular model would very likely become a component of reservoir computing devices...

Wen Zhou et al. Structure of the Human cGAS–DNA Complex Reveals Enhanced Control of Immune Surveillance. Cell, 2018 DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2018.06.026

Scientists have defined the structure and key features of a human immune-surveillance protein that guards against cancer and bacterial and viral infections. The identification of two human-specific variations in the protein closes a critical knowledge gap in immunology and cancer biology.

The human body is built for survival. Each one of its cells is closely guarded by a set of immune proteins armed with nearly foolproof radars that detect foreign or damaged DNA...

Fresh oranges. Credit: © Nitr / Fotolia

A new study has shown that people who regularly eat oranges are less likely to develop macular degeneration than people who do not eat oranges. Researchers at the Westmead Institute for Medical Research interviewed more than 2,000 Australian adults aged over 50 and followed them over a 15-year period.

The research showed that people who ate at least one serving of oranges every day had more than a 60% reduced risk of developing late macular degeneration 15 years later. Lead Researcher Associate Professor Bamini Gopinath from the University of Sydney said the data showed that 3flavonoids in oranges appear to help prevent against the eye disease...