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    Biologists turn Eavesdropping Viruses into Bacterial Assassins

    December 16, 2018, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology


    These E. coli bacteria harbor proteins from the eavesdropping virus. One of the viral proteins has been tagged with a red marker. When the virus is in the ‘stay’ mode (left), the bacteria grow and the red protein is spread throughout each cell. When the virus overhears that its hosts have achieved a quorum (right), the kill-stay decision protein is flipped to ‘kill’ mode. A second viral protein binds the red protein and sends it to the cell poles (yellow dots). All the cells in the right panel will soon die.
    Credit: Images courtesy of Bonnie Bassler and Justin Silpe, Department of Molecular Biology, Princeton University

    How cross-kingdom communication led to a breakthrough phage therapy...

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    Jiggly Jell-O to make Powerful new Hydrogen Fuel Catalyst

    December 16, 2018, Categories  Technology/Electronics, Chemistry/Nanotechnology

    An illustration shows hydrogen gas bubbling off of a sheet of metal carbide

    Two-dimensional metal carbides spark a reaction that splits water into oxygen and valuable hydrogen gas. Berkeley researchers have discovered an easy new recipe for cooking up these nanometer-thin sheets that is nearly as simple as making Jell-O from a box. (Xining Zang graphic, copyright Wiley)

    The inexpensive new material can split water just as efficiently as costly platinum. A cheap and effective new catalyst developed by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, can generate hydrogen fuel from water just as efficiently as platinum, currently the best – but also most expensive – water-splitting catalyst out there.

    The catalyst, which is composed of nanometer-thin sheets of metal carbide, is manufactured using a self-assembly process that relies on a surprising ingredien...

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    Tangled Magnetic fields power Cosmic Particle Accelerators

    December 16, 2018, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Cosmic particle accelerators

    SLAC researchers have found a new mechanism that could explain how plasma jets emerging from the center of active galaxies, like the one shown in this illustration, accelerate particles to extreme energies. Computer simulations (circled area) showed that tangled magnetic field lines create strong electric fields in the direction of the jets, leading to dense electric currents of high-energy particles streaming away from the galaxy. (Greg Stewart/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory)

    New way to explain how a black hole’s plasma jets boost particles to the highest energies observed in the universe. Magnetic field lines tangled like spaghetti in a bowl might be behind the most powerful particle accelerators in the universe...

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    Origins of Pain

    December 16, 2018, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    painful shoulder

    Researchers have identified the nerve-signaling pathway behind the deep, sustained pain that sets in following injury.

    Researchers identify pathway that drives sustained pain following injury. Withdrawing one’s hand to avoid injury and soothing the pain of that injury are two distinct evolutionary responses, but their molecular origins and signaling pathways have eluded scientists thus far.

    Now research led by investigators at Harvard Medical School, published Dec. 10 in Nature, identifies the nerve-signaling pathway behind the deep, sustained pain that sets in immediately following injury. The findings also shed light on the different pathways that drive reflexive withdrawal to avoid injury and the subsequent pain-coping responses.

    Clinical observations of patients with neurolog...

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