Genetics & Molecular Biology

PICM-19: Pig Liver Cells Could Power Artificial Liver

Chronic or acute liver failure can be deadly. Toxins take over, the skin turns yellow and higher brain function slows. A line of special liver cells could change that, says Neil Talbot, a Research Animal Scientist for the USDA Agricultural Research Servic ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 28 2013 - 10:27am

Biological Soap Opera: 'Selfish' Gene May Undermine Genome's Police

The nucleic and amino acids caught up in the infamous "selfish" segregation distorter (SD) saga may be just inanimate chemical compounds to most of us, but they have put on a soap opera for biologists since the phenomenon was discovered in fruit ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 5 2013 - 5:38pm

Corrected Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells Spark Muscle Regeneration

Human embryonic stem cells still get all of the attention- a company in California might be able to do a clinical trial for an applied hESC treatment and it was in the news everywhere, but researchers at the University of Minnesota's Lillehei Heart I ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 5 2013 - 6:00pm

Of Batman, Bacteria, And Yosemite Sam

In the past few centuries, our understanding of bacteria has progressed from mysterious medieval vapours, to the microscopic "animalcules" of van Leeuwenhoek, to the germ theory of disease à la  Pasteur, to the realizations that bacteria outnumbe ...

Article - Robert Cooper - Mar 11 2013 - 2:14pm

A Defense Of Plant/Crop Related Patents

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Article - Steve Savage - Mar 9 2013 - 1:35pm

Bone Mass And Fat Genetically Linked- Study

Is your body shape predetermined? Some role for heritage is obvious and there efforts to fix people into an epigenetic destiny as well but it may be that diet and exercise can only do so much. A new paper says body composition, including soft fat tissue a ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 11 2013 - 4:40pm

DNA 'Supercoiling' Caused By Protein In Cancer Cells

A protein known as mini-chromosome maintenance (MCM) has been found to change DNA topology and make DNA twist up into a so-called "supercoil". Supercoiling can be thought of as similar to twisting one end of a rubber band while holding the other ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 11 2013 - 1:37pm

Genome Of HeLa Cell Line Sequenced

HeLa cells, named after Henrietta Lacks, whose cells, which were cultured by George Otto Gey to create an immortal cell line for medical research, are the world's most commonly used human cell lines and have served as a standard for understanding man ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 12 2013 - 8:17pm

From Breast Tissue To Beating Heart Cells: A Rare Source Of Pluripotent Stem Cells From Adult Tissue

Beating heart cells (cardiomyocytes) are often used as an empowering imagery to depict important scientific advances in stem cell technology; advances that enable scientists to harness human embryonic stem cells to regenerate tissues that cannot easily be ...

Article - Jennifer Wong - Mar 13 2013 - 9:25pm

Lazarus Project Recreates Extinct Australian Frog

The Lazarus Project team says they have been able to recover cell nuclei of the extinct gastric-brooding frog, Rheobatrachus silus, from tissues collected in the 1970s and kept for 40 years in a conventional deep freezer.  The genome of Rheobatrachus silu ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 15 2013 - 7:13pm