Category Biology/Biotechnology

This is Dr Ruth Kluck of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. Credit: Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research

The apoptosis pathway could lead to drugs to treat cancer and autoimmune disease. Failure of apoptosis can allow cancer cells to grow unchecked or immune cells to inappropriately attack the body. Protein Bak is central to apoptosis. In healthy cells Bak sits in an inert state but when a cell receives a signal to die, Bak transforms into a killer protein that destroys the cell. Melbourne researchers Dr Sweta Iyer, Dr Ruth Kluck and colleagues have discovered an antibody they had produced to study Bak actually bound to the Bak protein and triggered its activation.

The 7D10 antibody triggers mitochondrial outer membrane permeabilization by binding to th...

(Colour online) Pre- and post-video test scores by age group (Study A). Values shown are means ± standard errors. All pre-test to post-test improvements were statistically significant (paired t-tests, p < .001 for each)

Does “edutainment” such as content-rich music videos have any place in the rapidly changing landscape of science education? A new study indicates that students can indeed learn serious science content from such videos. The study, titled ‘Leveraging the power of music to improve science education’ and published by International Journal of Science Education, examined over 1,000 students in a 3-part experiment, comparing learners’ understanding and engagement in response to 24 musical and non-musical science videos.

The central findings were that
(1) across ages and g...

beta-amyloid fibrils propagate from yeast surfaces and capture Candida albicans in culture medium. Credit: D.K.V. Kumar et al. / Science Translational Medicine (2016)

A new study from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators provides additional evidence that amyloid-beta protein, deposited in the form of beta-amyloid plaques in Alzheimer’s disease – is a normal part of the innate immune system, the body’s first-line defense against infection. Expression of human amyloid-beta (A-beta) was protective against potentially lethal infections in mice, in roundworms and in cultured human brain cells. The findings may lead to potential new therapeutic strategies and suggest limitations to therapies designed to eliminate amyloid plaques from patient’s brains.

“Neurodegeneration in Alzheime...

Celecoxib

Scientists from Florida campus of TSRI have found that one of the most widely prescribed pain and anti-inflammation drugs slows the growth rate of a specific kind of cancer in animal models and suggests the medication could have the same effect on other types of tumors. The new study focused on the effects of celecoxib (Pfizer’s Celebrex®) which targets “cyclooxygenase-2” (COX-2). This enzyme is also critical in the creation of prostaglandins, compounds that act like hormones and play a role in promoting tumor growth. COX-2 expression is typically low in normal tissue, but high in multiple types of cancers.

COX-2, Gordian knot or Achilles heel? (A) Physiological processes with significant COX-2 involvement...