PISCATAWAY, N.J., Feb 29, 2012 /PRNewswire-Asia/ --GenScript USA Inc., an internationally recognized biology contract research organization (CRO), became the most frequently referred biology CRO in the world by peer-reviewed journal articles in the year 2011.

Ever since its inceptionin 2002, GenScript has been consistently providing biological researchers with unmatched quality workmanship at affordable prices. In merely 9 years, GenScript has grown into a world leading CRO with over 1,000 employees. In 2011, more than 2,300 journal articles referred GenScript's services and products - making GenScript the most frequently referred CRO in the world!

"I am truly grateful to the trust and support of our clients. Their successes are the ultimate driving force for us," says Frank Zhang, the CEO and co-founder of GenScript. "I am very proud that our company has been recognized as an out-sourcing partner by more and more world-leading researchers."

In the last decade, over 1,100 CRO companies were established in the world, but few have maintained continuous growth. "The key to our robust and organic growth is the courage and dedication in pioneering innovative technologies. As always, we will continue to invest inthe development of cutting-edge enabling technologies. Our customers can count on us to deliver the faster, more reliable and cost-effective services and products than our competitors," commented Frank.

About GenScriptUSA, Inc. Headquartered in Piscataway, New Jersey, GenScript USA Inc. is a global contract research organization leader, with operations in USA, Japan, and China. As a market-driven and customer-focused company, GenScript provides comprehensive services for biological research and early-phase drug discovery, such as bio-reagents, assay development & screening, antibody drug development and animal model services. The bio-reagents services include custom gene synthesis and molecular biology, custom protein expression and purification, custom peptide synthesis, antibody production, and custom cell line development.

For further information, please contact:

Sally Wang Executive Vice President GENSCRIPT USA Inc. 1-(732) 885-9188 http://www.genscript.com

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GenScript Was the Most Frequently Referred Biology Contract Research Organization by Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles in ...

Public release date: 28-Feb-2012
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Contact: Ed Hayward
ed.hayward@bc.edu
617-552-4826
Boston College

CHESTNUT HILL, MA -- Boston College Biology Department Chairman Thomas Chiles has been named the Dr. Michael E. and Dr. Salvatore A. DeLuca Professor of Biology, the university announced today.

Chiles, whose research into lymphocyte metabolism and cancer biology is funded by the National Cancer Institute, the National Institutes of Health and private foundations, said he was honored to receive the endowed professorship, which will support his ongoing research, particularly projects involving undergraduates.

"It is a privilege and an honor to be named the DeLuca Professor of Biology," said Chiles, who joined the BC faculty in 1992. "I'm grateful to the University and the DeLuca family for their ongoing support of my lab's work and the advancement of the biological sciences here at BC."

Chiles' research focuses on understanding how a subset of lymphocytes, also known as B cells, grow and survive. The white blood cells play a critical role in the infectious disease-fighting ability of the immune system. Chiles' research has focused on how B cells respond to their environment in order to produce antibodies and regulatory cytokines and are able to adapt to survive while fighting pathogens and infectious agents.

That research led Chiles into an area known as metabolomics to study how the B cell's metabolism changes in response to external cues such as pathogens in order to support its radical transformation to an antibody producing plasma cell. In collaboration with Chemistry Professor Mary Roberts, the research is also providing insight into how energy metabolism is altered in cancer cells to support their growth and survival.

Chiles is also part of a multi-disciplinary team of campus scientists developing the next generation of nanosensors capable of detecting minute amounts of cancer biomarkers that signal the presence of disease. Developed in collaboration with Biology Research Professor Dong Cai and Physics Professor Mike Naughton the biosensor could prove to be a valuable new diagnostic tool for the early detection of cancer.

The DeLuca professorship was established in 1996 through an endowment from Dr. Salvatore A. and Lucy DeLuca to honor the memory of their son, Michael, a 1986 BC graduate who died in 1991. BC Biology Prof. Marc A.T. Muskavitch was the inaugural holder of the chair.

David Quigley, dean of the College of Arts & Sciences, said the selection of Chiles to hold the DeLuca Professorship was fitting recognition of Chiles' work as a researcher, teacher, mentor and administrator.

"I can't think of a colleague more deserving of this honor than Thomas Chiles," said Quigley. "In his 20 years at Boston College, Thomas has devoted himself to his students and to the Biology Department. His committed leadership has been instrumental in the considerable progress we've been making in the natural sciences in recent years."

An avid runner, Chiles participates in at least one marathon a year, typically alternating between the New York City and Chicago marathons. He cites art and music as areas of interest outside of science. He and his wife, Sheryl, live in Norfolk with their three Portuguese water dogs.

A native Floridian who earned his doctorate from the College of Medicine at the University of Florida, Chiles grew up in Jacksonville's Northside neighborhood. He credited his high school advanced biology teacher, Clayton Linstram, with fueling his interest in studying biology at Florida. In Gainesville, professors Joseph Powell and Michael Kilberg added further support, he said.

"I've always been real curious about everything, but especially science," said Chiles. "There was a pilot light there and it caught and turned into a full blown furnace when I arrived on the University of Florida campus and I never looked back."

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Boston College names Thomas Chiles the Deluca Professor of Biology

“In biology, magnetism is a unique and virtually orthogonal physical property.”

Only a few organisms can actively sense and utilize magnetic fields. Magnetotactic bacteria contain strings of iron-dense membrane-bound organelles filled with magnetic crystals called magnetosomes, which act like microscopic compasses. Bacteria that contain magnetosomes can detect the earth’s magnetic field, telling them which direction is up and helping them find oxygen closer to the surface of the water. Migratory animals can also navigate by following the earth’s magnetic field lines, but the mechanism by which they sense geomagnetic fields remains unclear.

All other organisms contain iron, but rarely enough to be noticeably magnetic. An amazing paper published today by Keiji Nishida and Pamela Silver in PLoS Biology demonstrates how by physiologically or genetically altering the iron content inside yeast, cells can become magnetized and attracted to magnets. Almost all cells, from bacteria to humans contain the protein ferritin, which sequesters iron inside the cell (preventing iron toxicity) and releases it as needed. Yeast don’t normally contain ferritin, typically collecting iron inside organelles called the vacuole instead. Deleting genes that help the vacuole pick up iron and genetically engineering yeast to produce ferritin can increase the amount of iron that yeast cells can take up, enough to noticeably increase their magnetism.

“The cell cultures were exposed to magnets and attraction was observed.”

When you add iron the media that yeast are growing in, even wild-type, unengineered cells are a little magnetic, this “basal magnetization” being caused by the iron accumulating in the vacuole. Using a superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID), Nishida shows that the synergistic effect of deleting iron accumulation in the vacuole and expressing ferritin makes the cells 3 times more magnetic than wild-type yeast, able to be quickly attracted to magnets placed underneath the liquid culture (in cute patterns or not):

Next, they wanted to see if they could control the yeast magnetism not just by adding more iron, but by controlling genes involved in iron homeostasis or cellular redox state. Redox balance determines how many electrons are available in the cell, and when there are fewer electrons iron will be oxidized from Fe2+ to Fe3+ and precipitate out of solution into magnetic clusters. Out of 60 gene deletions screened for changes in magnetism, one gene in particular was found to be necessary for the magnetism observed in high iron media. TCO89 is a nonessential part of TORC1, a complex of many proteins involved in regulating cellular stress responses, including nutrient and redox stress. When TCO89 was deleted, the cells were not magnetic, and when it was expressed in multiple copies the cells were more strongly attracted to the magnet. Because of this genetic dose-dependence, magnetism can be induced in yeast by controlling the expression of TCO89 with gene regulatory machinery that can be activated by external conditions, such as the presence of nutrients or chemicals. This can be used as a unique biological input or output in synthetic biology, improve efforts for precipitation and bioremediation of dangerous metals, as well as impact our understanding of cellular iron and electron metabolism.

“The importance of redox state in magnetization offers insight into magnetotactic bacteria.”

Magnetotactic bacteria live exclusively in microaerobic environments, using their magnetic crystals to find the perfect oxygen concentration. Oxygen availability influences the cell’s redox state, hinting at a possible evolutionary connection between iron sequestration, redox mediation, and the evolution of bio-magnetism. Perhaps cells adapted to certain redox conditions created the ideal chemical environment for the formation of iron crystals, which evolved into magnetosomes.

Magnetism is fascinating, and the fact that biology can create magnets genetically through processes fundamental to the biochemistry of all cells can seem nothing short of magical. Check out the video with the authors below:

and the paper at PLoS Biology (open access): Nishida K and Silver PA. (2012) “Induction of Biogenic Magnetization and Redox Control by a Component of the Target of Rapamycin Complex 1 Signaling Pathway.” PLoS Biology, e1001269.

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Magnetic Yeast

27.02.2012 - (idw) Max-Planck-Institut f?r Biochemie

Its the small things that matter in life. In structural biology these include proteins, enzymes and viruses. A single change in their molecular structure can mean the difference between function and malfunction, health and disease. On Thursday, February 23, the EU project Instruct launches a new distributed research infrastructure for the science of structural biology. The launch of Instruct will give academic and commercial scientists across Europe access to a full portfolio of integrated technologies. Wolfgang Baumeister, director at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry (MPIB) in Martinsried near Munich, Germany, is one of the members of the Instruct consortium. Breakthroughs in biomedical science are a step closer today, with the launch of a new distributed research infrastructure for the science of structural biology. Instruct is the dynamic hub of structural biology providing an integrated infrastructure of cutting edge technology, scientific expertise and pioneering training to enable structure determination from macromolecular to atomic resolution of proteins, protein complexes and single particles. It provides access to some of the most advanced technology in the world and is funded by the European Unions 7th Framework Program. The MPIB contributes as center of European excellence in the field of electron microscopy (EM). It offers state-of-the-art infrastructure for cryo-electron tomography as well as for single particle analysis, the full periphery for sample preparation including ion beam milling and the computational analysis of EM data. A full catalogue of the accessible technology is available on the Instruct Hub at http://www.structuralbiology.eu.

Instruct will be formally launched at a signing ceremony in Brussels on Thursday, February 23, attended by the Principal Investigators of each of the Instruct Centres, the national and regional funding agencies and Robert-Jan Smits, European Commission Director-General for Research and Innovation. Prof. Dave Stuart, Instruct Director, says; Never before have European biologists had a single point of access to all the technology and expertise they need to further their research. By bringing together the different disciplines, technologies and experts in European biology, Instruct will be helping to make the vision of truly integrated biology a reality for the first time.

Contact
Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Baumeister
Molecular Structural Biology
Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry
Am Klopferspitz 18
82152 Martinsried
E-Mail: baumeist@biochem.mpg.de
http://www.biochem.mpg.de/baumeister

Dr. Julia Rieder
EU Office
Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry
Am Klopferspitz 18
82152 Martinsried
Phone: +49 (0) 89 8578-2451
E-Mail: rieder@biochem.mpg.de
http://www.biochem.mpg.de/eu jQuery(document).ready(function($) { $("fb_share").attr("share_url") = encodeURIComponent(window.location); });
Weitere Informationen: http://www.structuralbiology.eu/content/instruct-launch-signals-new-opportunitie... - Instruct Press Release http://www.structuralbiology.eu - Instruct Homepage http://www.biochem.mpg.de/en/news/pressroom/index.html - Press Releases of the MPI of Biochemistry

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Unlocking the Secrets of Life Together - New Research Infrastructure for Structural Biology

In order to find a new substance that may one day find its way into a new cancer drug, scientists must first detect suitable drug candidates among all of the possible molecules. Once they have discovered a promising molecule, they must synthesise it and test its effectiveness before its further development into a drug can begin – all in all a laborious and, above all, time-consuming undertaking.

In the early 1990s, researchers pinned their hopes on the assembling of as many molecules as possible with the help of synthesis robots, and then trawling through these vast substance libraries for suitable compounds with the help of automated procedures. However, the initial enthusiasm for this approach soon turned into disillusionment: very few of the newly discovered molecules displayed any effect on living cells, and almost none of them completed the process of development into a finished product.

As a result, Herbert Waldmann and his colleagues at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology in Dortmund are looking for more efficient methods. The researchers’ main concern here is to both limit the search and simplify the associated synthesis process. “There are simply far too many different compounds to search randomly on the off chance that you’ll stumble onto something,” says Herbert Waldmann. The chemical structural space that includes all possible drug-like structures contains an estimated 1062 different molecules – a number, which, written out in full, fills two thirds of a line on a closely spaced typed page. Therefore, pre-selection is the most important thing.

To this end, the scientists search the chemical structural space using an ingenious computer program called Scaffold Hunter, which was developed at the Max Planck Institute in Dortmund. Scaffold Hunter generates maps of a selected chemical structural space based on structural criteria and enables the researchers to navigate the sea of possible molecules and approach islands of biological activity on the computer screen. “It actually works as simply as a video game,” says Herbert Waldmann. When navigating, the Scaffold Hunter searches for structural motifs that resemble already known structures with a particular biological characteristic. Because chemically related compounds are also very likely to have similar properties, the researchers can track down promising structures in this way. They can then use these as a basis and experiment with different chemical appendages to synthesise new compounds.

But how do the researchers actually know what they should look for? “We take direction from models found in nature,” Herbert Waldmann says, explaining the principle of biology-oriented synthesis (BIOS), based on which the Dortmund scientists carry out their work. “Natural substances were selected over the course of evolution to fulfil important tasks, mostly by binding to a certain protein receptor.” Many of these substances, which arise in animals, plants or microorganisms not only affect their actual target, but also influence human cells. The plant substances morphine and digitalis, which are used for pain relief and in the treatment of heart disease, are a well-known example of this. In total, over one third of all drugs are based on natural substances; in the area of cancer therapy, the proportion is even higher.

Such natural substances and other substances closely related to them are usually complex in structure - the second biggest challenge for the chemists. In order to synthesize the substances, the scientists usually must carry out numerous individual steps in sequence, and repeatedly isolate and purify the intermediate products before they finally obtain the desired end product. Synthesis robots usually fail when faced with the complexity of this task: because they can only master comparatively simple conversions, they can only produce small molecules whose structures are not very complex. Thus, the synthesis of natural substances requires manual work.

However, as Herbert Waldmann and his colleagues have shown, elegant methods are also available for this task. Using a so-called reaction cascade, the team succeeded in synthesising active substances from the centrocountin group – complex molecules with four ring systems in the middle which intervene in cell division and may, therefore, point the way to new anti-tumour drugs. And as is so often the case in science, the discovery arose by chance, as the researchers were actually aiming to synthesise an entirely different molecule. “But the reaction did not unfold as planned and we unexpectedly set a world record,” says Herbert Waldmann. The reaction cascade included a total of twelve steps – a length that has not yet been exceeded in cascade synthesis.

To set the reaction in motion, the researchers simply provided tryptamine and formylchromone and added two catalysts. All of the conversions then proceeded completely automatically, like a domino effect in which all of the tiles fall in succession, once the first one is toppled. The entire synthesis took place in a single vessel and included nine different individual reactions, in which two catalysis mechanisms were involved. “The synthesis of such complex molecules using traditional methods takes days, if not weeks,” says Kamal Kumar, who made a significant contribution to the development of the synthesis method. With the reaction cascade, the production process was successfully completed within a maximum of 30 minutes.

Once the researchers had isolated the new compounds, they wanted to establish, via tests on cell cultures, whether the molecules would have an effect on living cells. They made an important discovery here: following treatment with the centrocountins, during the division phase, instead of two daughter cells, three or more were produced from one cell. However, they were not viable. “The effect is due to the fact that the centrocountins influence the formation of the spindle apparatus,” explains Herbert Waldmann. This spindle-shaped structure usually forms on opposite sides of the dividing cell and ensures that chromosomes are halved and pulled back into the two daughter cells.

As the scientists demonstrated, following the addition of centrocountins, the cells form not two but several attachment points for the spindle apparatus, known as the centrosomes. Because the cell no longer appears to be capable of counting its centrosomes, the researchers gave the substances the name “centrocountins”. Due to the presence of numerous centrosomes, chromosomes are unevenly divided between the daughter cells. The division cycle then comes to a halt and programmed cell death is triggered in the newly produced cells – they commit suicide so to speak.

Could this effect possibly also be used to cause tumour cells to commit suicide? This is the hope of the scientists in Dortmund. The effect of the centrocountins arises from the fact that they bind to two proteins called NPM and Crm1. Both play an important role in the formation of the spindle apparatus and are, therefore, potential target molecules for cancer treatment. “A drug that binds to both NPM and Crm1 has not existed up to now,” says Slava Ziegler, another scientist in Herbert Waldmann’s team.

The researchers do not yet know the precise mechanism by which the newly-discovered substances influence the function of the two proteins. For this reason, they are now focusing on clarifying the biochemical processes involved. When they have obtained this information, they then aim to synthesise a compound based on the centrocountins which cou
ld become a possible active agent candidate – and with a lot of luck, eventually find its way into a new cancer drug.

Provided by Max-Planck-Gesellschaft (news : web)

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Biology-oriented synthesis (BIOS) - cancer drugs based on natural models

FOR many south-west residents, the abundance of seaweed on Warrnambool’s foreshore is little more than an eyesore and a reason to pinch their noses.

But a group of second-year Deakin University marine biology students this week found the slimy mounds to be a habitat rich with life.

In a project designed to improve their ability to sort through marine samples and identify organisms, the students were surprised to find so much activity, according to senior lecturer in marine biology and ecology Alecia Bellgrove.

“It’s a really important component of the ecosystem,” she said.

“A group of second-year marine biology students came back to uni a couple of weeks early for a pre-trimester field trip.

“We wanted to capitalise on the better weather and low tides.

“The main focus is to sample the biodiversity of marine organisms in the local environment.”

Records of the changes in biodiversity over time can also help to explain climate change, Dr Bellgrove said.

The 41 students collected samples of organisms in the seaweed near the harbour pavilion, in the sandstone pools of Lady Bay and in the mouth of Port Fairy’s Moyne River.

“They looked at what sorts of species there are, how many species groups — what’s living where, basically,” Dr Bellgrove said.

“What species are native, what species are occurring naturally and are abundant.

“They’ll get a bunch of different samples and use microscopes to work out what they are in the labs.”

The group scoured the mouth of the Moyne River on Wednesday for organisms living high and low on the shore and under the water.

“Some of them went in a boat ... they were running a dredge along to find out what organisms are living in the sediment on the bottom of the ocean,” Dr Bellgrove said.

The students will work in groups to collate the data for a graded report, the lecturer said.

Next year they will finish the three-year course with a bachelor of environmental science and marine biology.

Yesterday marked the final day of the intensive field trip, which began last Tuesday.

Originally posted here:
Marine biology students seek hidden creatures

By a GenomeWeb staff reporter

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – A group of international research institutes have joined together to launch an initiative to provide access to resources for structural biology research to scientists across Europe and in Israel.

Organized by the European Union's European Strategy Forum of Research Infrastructures program, the Instruct Integrating Biology, or Instruct, initiative will provide academic and commercial researchers access to equipment and expertise spread across 15 collaborating research centers.

The collaborators launched the Instruct initiative at a signing ceremony on Thursday in Brussels, and agreed to provide access to up to 20 percent of their resources.

Instruct will provide access to a range of technologies including tools for proteomic and labeling mass spectrometry applications, computational biology resources, and technologies and expertise for use in sample production, biophysical characterization, crystallization, nuclear magnetic resonance imaging, and others.

"Never before have European biologists had a single point of access to all the technology and expertise they need to further their research. By bringing together the different disciplines, technologies and experts in European biology, Instruct will be helping to make the vision of truly integrated biology a reality for the first time," Instruct Director Dave Stuart said in a statement.

"Instruct will allow laboratories throughout Europe to gain ready access to the most advanced facilities, technologies, and methodologies. Israeli scientists and their European counterparts will now have access to facilities they could only have dreamed of before," added Gideon Schreiber, a professor at the Weizmann Institute and deputy director of Israel's Instruct Core Centre.

The program is based around an online hub that already includes over 500 researchers from 25 countries, and enables them to tailor their online profiles to match their interests and priorities.

Members from institutes in eight countries signed the the agreement joining Instruct on Thursday, including the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, and the UK.

Original post:
European Institutes Form Structural Biology Resource

By Alison McLennan & Matthew Rimmer

The field of synthetic biology poses a number of challenges for patent law.

With promises of improved medical treatments, greener energy and even artificial life, the field of synthetic biology has captured the public imagination and attracted significant government and commercial investment.

This excitement reached a crescendo on 21 May 2010, when scientists at the J Craig Venter Institute in the United States announced that they had made a “self-replicating synthetic bacterial cell”. This was the first living cell to have an entirely human-made genome, which means that all of the cell’s characteristics were controlled by a DNA sequence designed by scientists.

This achievement in biological engineering was made possible by combining molecular biotechnology, gene synthesis technology and information technology.

Possibilities of synthetic biology
In his autobiography, A Life Decoded, J. Craig Venter contends that synthetic biology has the potential to address concerns about energy security, climate change and sustainable development: “My company, Synthetic Genomics Inc., is already trying to turn an organism into a biofactory that could make clean hydrogen fuel from sunlight and water or soak up more carbon dioxide.”

He elaborated on his long-term scientific aspirations: “From there I want to take us far from shore into unknown waters, to a new phase of evolution, to the day when one DNA-based species can sit down at a computer to design another.”

Venter maintained: “I plan to show that we understand the software of life by creating true artificial life”.

Another leading researcher, Jay D. Keasling, is confident that the field of synthetic biology can increase access to essential medicines – particularly to provide protection against malaria.

However, civil society groups and technology activists have raised concerns about the risks synthetic biology may pose to security, public health and the environment. The ETC Group, for instance, is concerned that organisms made with synthetic biology (such as engineered bacteria) could be released into the environment, with unknown effects. They’re also concerned about potential weaponisation of synthetic biology.

Patentability
There has been much controversy over the application of patent law to emerging technologies, with large legal battles over the patentability of information technology and business methods, genetic testing, medical information, and stem cell research.

The field of synthetic biology also poses a number of challenges for patent law and public policy. One of the most important questions patent experts (such as Professor Graham Dutfield) are asking is whether synthetic biology is too different from previous biotechnologies to apply existing objections to the patenting of living things.

In addition to considering patentability of synthetic biology, patent offices and courts will have to consider the novelty, inventiveness and utility of the claimed inventions and scope of the claims, in light of the scientific knowledge in this field.

In the United States, patent applications for synthetic biology have fallen into two broad categories: ?1) biological tools, methods and products.?
2) computer programs. This includes software for design of biological devices and programs for analysis of biochemical activity within cells.

Some US patent applications have focused on the construction of a synthetic cell. Scientists at the J Craig Venter Institute, for example, have filed applications for patents on a minimal bacterial genome, a synthetic genome and a method of installing a genome into a cell.

Other US patent applications have involved the creation of useful biological products from cells, such as Jay D. Keasling and colleagues’ production of a malaria drug precursor in a genetically modified cell.

There are also patent applications for various methods of biofuel production.

Law reform
US President Barack Obama’s Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues recommended that synthetic biology be regulated using the principles of public beneficence, responsible stewardship, intellectual freedom and responsibility, democratic deliberation and justice and fairness.

The Commission was, however, hopeful that synthetic biology could “be developed in an ethically responsible manner”.

But intellectual property expert Arti K. Rai has concerns that, as patent thickets have been a problem in the information technology and biotechnology sector, this could also slow the progress of synthetic biology research.

To counter this risk, some scientists and researchers have called for the introduction of a broad defence of experimental use, under patent law, to protect them from the threat of patent litigation.
The US-based group of scientists, BioBricks Foundation, already promotes open innovation in this field and have created a space to share their own research, right from the establishment of a new field.

Sharing of information and resources in synthetic biology research is facilitated by the Registry of Standard Biological Parts, which is supported by a culture of sharing in the synthetic biology community.

Somewhat more radically, biopunks – do-it-yourself biologists – question the use of intellectual property rights altogether in the field of synthetic biology. The international group of do-it-yourself biologists, known as DIYbio, has groups in North America, Europe and Asia, and individual members in many countries including Australia.

In his book, Biopunk, Marcus Wohlsen explains that in the US he’s observed, “An intellectual property system designed to spur innovation by allowing inventors to profit off their inventions has become in biopunks’ eyes a high-stakes game of low-stakes progress.”

The emerging field of synthetic biology is ripe for law review and reform, both overseas and at home in Australia. We’re seeing a proliferation of patents in this field, with the potential for significant impact on health, the environment and the economy.

If governments are serious about the progress of biological research, they will have to consider the implications of patenting and licensing of synthetic biology.

Alison McLennan ?is a PhD candidate & Vice-Chancellor’s Scholar at the Australian National University, where Matthew Rimmer is an ?ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor in Intellectual Property. This article was originally published at The Conversation.

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Inventing life: patent law and synthetic biology

Public release date: 24-Feb-2012
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Contact: Ben Norman
Lifesciencenews@wiley.com
44-124-377-0375
Wiley-Blackwell

Hoboken, NJ ? February 24, 2012; Wiley-Blackwell, the scientific, technical, medical and scholarly publishing business of John Wiley & Sons, Inc., has launched two new interdisciplinary review publications: WIREs Developmental Biology and WIREs Membrane Transport and Signaling.

WIREs Developmental Biology will focus on how single cells and fertilized eggs produce a complex, fully patterned adult organism. Edited by John C. Gerhart (University of California, Berkeley), Gail R. Martin (University of California, San Francisco) and Eric F. Wieschaus (Princeton University), this new resource is published in partnership with the Society for Developmental Biology(SDB).

WIREs Membrane Transport and Signaling will explore the regulated transport of molecules through cell membranes and the transmission of extracellular signals by cellular receptors. Both are essential processes for cell survival and cell-cell communication. The publication is edited by Alexej Verkhratsky (The University of Manchester) and Maiken Nedergaard (Center for Translational Neuromedicine, University of Rochester).

Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews, known as WIREs, are unique hybrids of encyclopedias and journals which emphasise the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration in research and education.

Each title provides authoritative, encyclopaedic coverage of diverse scientific fields with high-quality reviews commissioned from international expert contributors. Each review article is fully citable and qualifies for abstracting, indexing and ISI ranking.

The WIREs model is built around four article types:

Overviews provide broad, relatively non-technical treatment of a core issue. Advanced Reviews are aimed at researchers and advanced students, surveying the literature in a fashion similar to a standard review journal. Opinions express a particular view on a topic that is under current debate. Focus Articles are more technical in nature, homing in on specific examples and implementations of research.

"Developmental biology is intrinsically interdisciplinary, combining embryology, cell biology, genetics, physiology, evolutionary biology, and more. Our affiliation with WIREs will help advance the SDB mission to foster excellence in research and education through communication of key advances in the field," said Ida Chow, Executive Officer of the Society for Developmental Biology.

"We have had a very positive response to the WIREs publishing model from the scientific community," said Sean Pidgeon, Wiley-Blackwell Vice President and Publisher of Life Science Review and Reference Works. "The launch of these two new titles will powerfully reinforce the role of the WIREs in promoting interdisciplinary communication and collaboration."

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Access to both WIREs titles is free for the first two years. Register here: http://olabout.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-406102.html

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Wiley-Blackwell launches 2 interdisciplinary review titles in developmental and membrane biology

Marine biology class students kayak, snorkel and camp their way through Florida.

Saint Leo, FL (PRWEB) February 24, 2012

This summer, Saint Leo University students pursuing a degree in biology will dive to new learning depths. A nine-week intensive class introducing students to marine biology fieldwork will take learning out of the classroom and into the mangrove swamps, salt marshes and oyster reefs surrounding the Florida university's liberal arts campus.

With its central Florida location providing quick access to nearby waterways and beaches, Saint Leo University is ideally situated for field research in natural outdoor settings.

Now in its second year, this summer's "Field Problems in Marine Biology" class alternates between the field and the classroom, with students conducting research in a variety of natural habitats and then coming together in the classroom for reflection and analysis. To expand their knowledge of major marine environments, students will kayak, snorkel and camp in several locations, including Tampa Bay, Sapelo Island, Rookery Bay and the Florida Keys.

“We want to make the field the students’ sole focus,” says Dr. William Ellis, associate professor of biology, who teaches the innovative class. “Throughout the nine weeks, students eat, sleep and breathe biology.”

Capped at eight students to encourage student-professor interaction and small-group discussion, the course is open to students pursuing their bachelors in biology, as well as students from other disciplines, with instructor permission.

Close Encounters of the Marine Kind

Saint Leo's popular marine biology course has been called “the toughest class you’ll ever love” for offering students challenging, once-in-a-lifetime experiences.

In the previous class, student work has included a link between the abundance of a marsh periwinkle and the height of cordgrass in a southeastern salt marsh, as well as research about flow rates in a mangrove system affecting settlement by crab larvae. While eating dinner together each night, students present their work to the group.

The course is filled with unexpected, up-close encounters with wildlife. Students photograph birds for a field guide. They catch their own lobster for dinner. They snorkel in the Florida Keys, and spy underwater fireworks created by crabs bumping into plankton. Students have even welcomed surprise visitors within a few feet of their campsite—green sea turtles, which are among the largest sea turtles in the world at up to 700 pounds.

More Marine Biology Opportunities at Saint Leo University

Working hand-in-hand with biology professors, Saint Leo students can conduct their own research in directed, independent studies and submit their findings for publication. Currently, Dr. Ellis is helping a student publish the first study of its kind that quantifies the structural complexity of oyster reefs using CT scanning.

In addition to this summer's “Field Problems in Marine Biology” Saint Leo’s biology department also offers an oceanography class.

With a distinctive combination of hands-on learning and faculty mentorship, Saint Leo students who have received their degree in biology have found internships and careers with a variety of competitive organizations, including Harvard Forest, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the University of Wisconsin, University of South Florida and Southwest Florida Water Management District.

About Saint Leo University

Saint Leo ranks as one of the top universities in the South, according to U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” list. Saint Leo’s traditional liberal arts campus, located 30 miles north of Tampa, educates nearly 2,000 students. Total enrollment across its campus, regional education centers, and online programs exceeds 15,000. Among the oldest Catholic universities in Florida, Saint Leo is one of the nation's 10 leading providers of higher education to the U.S. military, and is a nationally recognized leader in online education.

To learn more about Saint Leo’s bachelors in biology degree, visit http://www.saintleo.edu/Academics/School-of-Arts-Sciences/Undergraduate-Degree-Programs/Bachelors-Degree-in-Biology

###

Jo-Ann Johnston
Saint Leo University
352-588-8237
Email Information

Originally posted here:
Saint Leo Students Pursuing Bachelors Degree in Biology Dive into Science with Hands-On Field Work

By a GenomeWeb staff reporter

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Researchers at the University of Southampton and the University of Oxford have netted a £4 million ($6.3 million) grant from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council to develop a new synthetic biology technology that could aid in the production of useful DNA and RNA structures.

The team will use the funding, awarded under the strategic Longer and Larger program, to develop a technique for "clicking" DNA and RNA segments together that could make synthetic biology research projects cheaper, more efficient, and more scalable, BBSRC said this week.

The technology aims to address one of the difficulties of synthesizing DNA molecules that makes it slow and laborious — the development of large numbers of short DNA strands that are linked together using delicate enzymes. The "click" technique replaces those enzymes with chemical methods to create stronger links between DNA and RNA that make them more useful for industrial scale applications, according to Southampton professor Tom Brown, a joint leader on the project.

"This new technology is an important addition to the toolbox of molecular techniques that is allowing researchers to explore how biological systems function by creating simplified and modified biomolecular machinery," Andrew Turberfield, a professor at Oxford who is participating on the project, said in a statement.

See the rest here:
Southampton, Oxford Lands $6.3M Grant for Synthetic Biology

Public release date: 23-Feb-2012
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Contact: Yivsam Azgad
news@weizmann.ac.il
972-893-43856
Weizmann Institute of Science

Major transformations in biomedical science are on the horizon with the establishment of the world-class Integrated Structural Biology Infrastructure (Instruct) in support of European biomedical research.

The European Strategy Forum of Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) is involved in establishing about 40 such infrastructures, seven of them in biomedical sciences. Instruct is one such biomedical project, whose aim is to provide pan-European user access to state-of-the-art equipment, technologies and manpower in cellular structural biology. This will allow Europe to maintain a competitive edge and play a leading role in this vital research area.

The Weizmann Institute of Science, together with Tel Aviv University, has been chosen as one of the seven Core Centres, joining prestigious institutions in the UK, Italy, France and Germany.

"Structural Biology is a scientific area in which Israeli scientists have been leading for many years, as evidenced by Weizmann Institute's Prof. Ada Yonath, who won a Nobel Prize in 2009 for her pioneering work on solving the structure of ribosomes," says the Institute's Prof. Joel Sussman, Director of Israel's Instruct Core Centre.

Crucial to understanding how the living cell functions is knowledge of the three-dimensional structures of its proteins and nucleic acids, how these interact with one another, and their arrangement and dynamics within the cell. But no single discipline alone is able to decipher this. "In addition to the Weizmann Institute having developed world-class research programs in several of the disciplines relevant to Instruct, including electron microscopy, mass spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, NMR, bioinformatics and structural proteomics, the Israel Structural Proteomics Center (ISPC) has played a synergistic role in integrating and coordinating all these various disciplines," says Sussman. The ISPC was established by scientists from the Weizmann Institute, with Sussman as its director, in order to increase the efficiency of protein structure determination.

Mirroring the philosophy of the ISPC, Instruct will merge the information obtained by the various structural biology methods and techniques in order to provide a dynamic picture of key cellular processes, both in vivo and in vitro, on all scales from individual macromolecules, through complexes and organelles to the whole cell. This knowledge will permit major advances in understanding and treating diseases.

"Instruct will allow laboratories throughout Europe to gain ready access to the most advanced facilities, technologies and methodologies. Israeli scientists and their European counterparts will now have access to facilities they could only have dreamed of before," says Weizmann Institute's Prof. Gideon Schreiber, Deputy Director of Israel's Instruct Core Centre, as well as of the ISPC. "We hope this core centre will stimulate new collaborative research projects between laboratories throughout Europe with the Weizmann Institute and with other Israeli institutions, and also attract more graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and visiting scientists from all over the world."

Instruct will formally be launched at a signing ceremony in Brussels on 23rd February, 2012, and Weizmann Institute Vice President Prof. Haim Garty will be signing on behalf of the Weizmann Institute, Tel Aviv University and the State of Israel.

###

More information can be found by visiting the Instruct Hub at http://www.structuralbiology.eu

Prof. Joel Sussman's research is supported by Mr. and Mrs. Yossie Hollander, Israel; the S. & J. Lurje Memorial Foundation; the Jean and Jula Goldwurm Memorial Foundation; the Samuel Aba and the Sisel Klurman Foundation; the Bruce H. and Rosalie N. Rosen Family Foundation; and Mr. and Mrs. Howard Garoon, Glencoe, IL. Prof. Joel Sussman is the incumbent of the Morton and Gladys Pickman Professorial Chair in Structural Biology.

The Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, is one of the world's top-ranking multidisciplinary research institutions. Noted for its wide-ranging exploration of the natural and exact sciences, the Institute is home to 2,700 scientists, students, technicians and supporting staff. Institute research efforts include the search for new ways of fighting disease and hunger, examining leading questions in mathematics and computer science, probing the physics of matter and the universe, creating novel materials and developing new strategies for protecting the environment.

Weizmann Institute news releases are posted on the World Wide Web at http://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il, and are also available at http://www.eurekalert.org.

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Excerpt from:
European Integrated Structural Biology Infrastructure launching

Public release date: 23-Feb-2012
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Contact: Natasha Pinol
npinol@aaas.org
202-326-7088
American Association for the Advancement of Science

Tammy Long got an idea of what science was all about when she went to Costa Rica as a college student.

"My instructors basically said, 'There's the rainforest. Go find something that you'd be interested in researching,'" she says. "That completely changed what I was going to do for a career. They had introduced me to inquiry."

Such a free-form approach might not have worked for every student?Long, now an assistant professor in plant biology at Michigan State University, was someone who had gravitated toward studying nature even as a child growing up in southwest Michigan. Still, asking her to follow her own curiosity about the rainforest made a strong impact and is somewhat similar to the approach used in her Campus Trees biology lab module, which inspires students to develop their own research methods. This month, Science magazine has chosen Campus Trees to win the Science Prize for Inquiry-Based Instruction.

The Science Prize for Inquiry-Based Instruction was developed to showcase outstanding materials, usable in a wide range of schools and settings, for teaching introductory science courses at the college level. The materials must be designed to encourage students' natural curiosity about how the world works, rather than to deliver facts and principles about what scientists have already discovered. Organized as one free-standing "module," the materials should offer real understanding of the nature of science, as well as providing an experience in generating and evaluating scientific evidence. Each month, Science publishes an essay by a recipient of the award, which explains the winning project. The essay about Campus Trees will be published on February 24.

"We're trying to advance science education," says Bruce Alberts, editor-in-chief of Science. "This competition provides much-needed recognition to innovators in the field whose efforts promise significant benefits for students and for science literacy in general. The publication in Science of an article on each laboratory module will help guide educators around the globe to valuable free resources that might otherwise be missed."

Long developed Campus Trees with Sara Wyse, an assistant professor of biological sciences at Bethel University. At the start, Long's goal was to restructure an introductory biology curriculum and redesign the lab portion of the class, which was taught by graduate teaching assistants. Wyse had begun researching the impact of alternative training on graduate TAs, and so the two involved TAs in their project early on. At a 2008 "boot camp" for the TAs, the teaching assistants agreed that biology lab should be about the process of science?how science answers questions by testing ideas and gathering and evaluating evidence?rather than as a series of preplanned steps. They also agreed that the research undertaken had to be "real," even if that meant outcomes would sometimes be unexpected, contradictory, or confusing.

"Instructors worry so much about having an experiment that's going to work, but it's important for students to come up with questions and methods of their own?and to live through some mistakes," says Long. "That's really where the richness of the learning comes in."

These educational goals were emphasized as Long, Wyse, and five TAs set out to develop Campus Trees, which became a semester-long study of phenology, or the patterns of recurrent natural events. Phenologic trends can be indicators of environmental change, including climate change. Taking the citizen science project known as the National Phenology Network as their model, they turned to the trees on the campus of Michigan State as their living laboratory.

Wanting to keep the science "real" and not wanting to prescribe a cookbook series of steps for the students in the lab, the developers were quickly confronted with the problem of how to produce consistent, reliable data. The conclusion was that the students themselves would develop their own methods for documenting the color change and dropping of the trees' leaves, for example, designing the methods, testing them, and then evaluating their effectiveness.

As Long points out, quantifying color in a tree is not straightforward, requiring some system for keeping an ongoing evaluation consistent.

"The students came up with crazy ideas for assessing color," says Long, referring to their innovative ideas of using a Twister spinner to randomly select which branches to sample, electronic color-pickers, and numberic RGB (red-green-blue) codes. "It was fantastic. They were so creative."

Students don't know at the beginning of the lab that multiple research teams are studying the same trees. When they discover this later in the process, they are asked to compare the techniques developed by the other teams to their own methods. Surprisingly, Long says, many students take this as a challenge, carefully considering which methods worked best for each type of research question being considered.

"Students learn firsthand about hypothesis development, data collection, and the value of sharing and maintaining databases," says Melissa McCartney, editorial fellow at Science. "Multiple samplings of the same trees by different groups show students how slightly different methods can yield different results, highlighting the important of tackling a research question with multiple approaches."

Long says the Campus Trees lab module is as much intended to train students to be science-literate, to understand how science works, as it is a training tool for students who will actually become scientists. At the same time, and in keeping with the philosophy that the research be real, the module is meant to provide usable data.

"What I hope is that we can start engaging our huge introductory classes in inquiry, and generate long-term data sets that can be used both for instruction and to serve the interests of researchers on campus," she says.

The IBI prize and corresponding essay in Science draw attention to this idea behind Campus Trees, a system of learning that Long feels is highly transferable and adaptable to other contexts and types of science research.

"I hope that winning this prize legitimizes the notion that we can use an inquiry approach to produce multiple benefits?to students, to their instructors, and to authentic research interests."

###

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world's largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science as well as Science Translational Medicine and Science Signaling. AAAS was founded in 1848, and includes some 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of 1 million. The non-profit AAAS is open to all and fulfills its mission to "advance science and serve society" through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more. For the latest research news, log onto EurekAlert!, http://www.eurekalert.org, the premier science-news Web site, a service of AAAS.

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the
accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Original post:
Science magazine honors biology lab that helps students design research

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/c007b0/methods_in_systems) has announced the addition of Elsevier Science and Technology's new report "Methods in Systems Biology" to their offering.

Systems biology is a term used to describe a number of trends in bioscience research, and a movement which draws on those trends. This volume in the Methods in Enzymology series comprehensively covers the methods in Systems Biology. With an international board of authors, this volume is split into sections that cover subjects such as Machines for systems biology, Protein production and quantification for Systems Biology, and Enzymatic Assays in Systems Biology Research. This volume in the Methods in Enzymology series comprehensively covers the methods in Systems Biology.

With an international board of authors, this volume is split into sections that cover subjects such as Machines for systems biology, Protein production and quantification for Systems Biology, and Enzymatic Assays in Systems Biology Research.

Key Topics Covered:

Section 1 - Strategies in systems biology. top down, middle-out and bottom-up strategies - Hans V. Westerhoff

Section 2 - Machines for systems biology - Roy Goodacre. 4 chapters explaining the workings of four of the most important measurement techniques for systems biology: Mass spectrometry Microscopy Spectroscopy

Section 3 - Nucleic acids and systems biology - James Adaye. 4 Chapters on DNA sequencing, Arrays studies, PCR, deep sequencing

Section 4 - Protein production and quantification for Systems Biology - Naglis Malys and Kathleen Carroll. Chapter 1: Quantification of proteins and their modifications using QconCAT technology. Chapter 2: Mass spectrometric based quantitative proteomics using SILAC

Section 5 - Enzymatic Assays in Systems Biology Research Farid Khan, Hanan Messiha and Malgorzata Adamczyk. Chapter 1: Enzymatic Assays in Systems Biology Research: Strategies and challenges. Chapter 2: Real-time kinetic assay technologies for characterising enzymes in metabolic pathways.

Section 6 - Sample preparation in Metabolomics Studies - Warwick Dunn & Catherine Winder. Chapter 1 - The use of continuous culture in systems biology investigations. Chapter 2 - Metabolomic studies of yeast - methods for sample collection in profiling and quantitation studies

Section 7 - Mathematical modelling in Systems Biology - Kieran Smallbone & Evangelos Simeonidis. Chapter 1: Building a kinetic model of a metabolic pathway. Chapter 2: Making systems biology models reusable: the role of standards and biological semantics

Section 8 - Understanding systems biology (Hans Westerhoff). 1. Elementary mode analysis 2. Flux analysis 3. Flux balance analysis 4. Metabolic control analysis 5. Supply-demand analysis 6. Modular kinetic analysis

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/c007b0/methods_in_systems

See original here:
Research and Markets: Methods in Systems Biology - 2011 Comprehensively Covers the Methods in Systems Biology

Telome Health, Inc.™, a privately held biotechnology company focused on the role of telomere biology in human health, has announced that co-founder and Nobel Laureate Elizabeth Blackburn has been awarded Innovator of the Year by Silicon Valley Business Journal.

Menlo Park, CA (PRWEB) February 23, 2012

Telome Health, Inc.™, a privately held biotechnology company focused on the role of telomere biology in human health, has announced that co-founder and Nobel Laureate Elizabeth Blackburn has been awarded Innovator of the Year by Silicon Valley Business Journal.

"I am very pleased and honored to receive this award, especially coming from the heart of innovation, Silicon Valley, and to acknowledge the efforts of my amazing colleagues” said Dr. Blackburn.

Dr Blackburn is an internationally recognized thought leader and expert on the biology of telomeres. She was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology along with Drs. Carol Greider and Jack Szostak for her work in this field. She co-founded Telome Health in 2010 with colleagues Calvin Harley, Elissa Epel and Jue Lin who also recognized experts in the field of telomere biology. Dr. Blackburn is Morris Herzstein Professor of Biology and Physiology at the University of California at San Francisco. She also serves on the Board and is a Scientific Advisory for Telome Health.

“We are thrilled that Dr. Blackburn has been awarded the Innovator of The Year by The Silicon Valley and San Jose Business Journal” noted Daniel Hunt, CEO of Telome Health. “This is just one of the many notable and prestigious awards that she has received for her significant contributions to the field of telomere biology. We are proud to work with Elizabeth to develop a diagnostic test that will further empower individuals and physicians to manage disease risk using a more proactive, personalized approach.”

Telome Health, Inc. is developing a proprietary assay that measures telomere length called the TeloTest™ that it anticipates launching in 2012. Telomeres are repetitive DNA sequences at the ends of human chromosomes that protect them from unraveling similar to the plastic tips (aglets) located on the ends of shoelaces. Research supports that as telomeres get shorter, the chromosome becomes less stable. If this shortening occurs faster than is observed in a normal or healthy population, it may be an indication of stress or other co-morbid factors that have not yet been detected by other tests or actual symptoms.

The TeloTest assay utilizes quantitative polymerase chain assay, also called qPCR, and is the most clinically validated technology used to determine telomere length. “The body of scientific and clinical evidence using qPCR is enormous” said Blackburn. “It is really the technology for which all others should be compared since such studies using this technology conclusively support that negative changes in telomere length is directly associated aging and disease risk.”

Envisaged as being taken annually, the test serves as a “check engine” light that may provide an early warning to individuals and their physicians that further medical assessment or changes in lifestyle habits are warranted.

About Telome Health, Inc.

Telome Health, Inc. is a privately held biotechnology company that is focused on developing proprietary telomere based technologies to diagnose, prevent and treat human disease. Its first product, the TeloTest is anticipated to launch in 2012. The company was co-founded by Elizabeth Blackburn who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for her scientific contributions in the field of telomere biology and Drs. Calvin Harley, Elissa Epel and Jue Li who are internationally recognized experts in this field. The company is located in Menlo Park, CA.

Contact:

Patricia Sinatra

VP of Corporate Development and Strategy

Telome Health, Inc.

650.289.0289

http://www.telomehealth.com/media/index.html

###

Patricia Sinatra
Telome Health, Inc.
650.289.0289
Email Information

Read more:
Telome Health Co-Founder And Nobel Laureate Elizabeth Blackburn Awarded Innovator Of The Year

Associate Professor of Evolutionary Biology Sohini Ramachandran received the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship for her research in computational and evolutionary molecular biology, according to the foundation's Feb. 15 press release. The award is granted to young scientists who are "rising stars, the next generation of scientific leaders," according to the release. 

The fellowship includes a grant of $50,000 to advance Ramachandran's research, which pertains specifically to evolutionary history based on variations in the human genome over time.

"I'm really interested in historical relationships between human populations and the signatures they leave on our genome," Ramachandran said. Specifically, she studies topics like the mating interaction between Europeans and Latin Americans during early colonization and the modern relevance of the genetic signatures of humans in Africa from 100,000 years ago. Her research is computational and statistical, using data gathered across the globe to mathematically map out aspects of the human genome.

"I feel really honored," Ramachandran said. "The Sloan Fellowship has this really exciting history of making contributions to young faculty." 

The foundation gives grants in eight scientific areas but only began giving grants in computational and evolutionary molecular biology in 2002, when Ramachandran began graduate school.  

Each of the 126 recipients of the 2012 fellowship was nominated by a colleague and then picked by an independent panel of scholars. Ramachandran was nominated by Mark Bertness, chair of the department of ecology and evolutionary biology. 

"She's a spectacular young faculty member working on really interesting problems," Bertness said. He added that as a promising female scientist, Ramachandran is a role model for young women in scientific fields.

Ramachandran arrived at the University in summer 2010 after receiving her undergraduate and graduate degrees from Stanford University and completing a post-graduate year at Harvard. At Brown, she said she has been influenced by the supportive and collaborative environment in her department and the opportunity to teach undergraduate students beginning this year. 

The grant money she will receive will enable students doing research with her to pursue projects that were previously impossible due to lack of funding, she said.

"I've been wanting to generate some data in collaboration with people in Newport to collect genetic data from different breeds of cattle and sheep that humans have domesticated," Ramachandran said. She plans to use this data to study how variation has changed in domesticated breeds and what traits humans have selected. 

"It's just a nice, prestigious recognition that one of our new junior faculty members has this level of recognition this early in her career," Bertness said. 

Brown usually has one or two winners a year, Ramachandran said. Last year, two faculty members received this fellowship — David Badre, assistant professor in the department of cognitive, linguistic and psychological sciences, and Anastasia Volovich, associate professor of physics.  

"It enabled me to continue research," Volovich said, who studies wave amplitudes related to the theory of motives in algebraic geometry. The funds from the fellowship enabled the physics department to bring distinguished visitors, she added, and will allow her to travel to some conferences. Volovich emphasized the unrestrictive nature of the Sloan Foundation grant compared to other grants. "You can use it however you want," she said.  

See the rest here:
Prof honored as ‘rising star’ in evolutionary bio

20-02-2012 14:41 Hank tells us about the city of Eukaryopolis - the animal cell that is responsible for all the cool things that happen in our bodies. Like SciShow on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com Follow SciShow on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com More info. on the structures described in this video linked to in the Google Document here: dft.ba Table of Contents time codes 1) Robert Hooke 1:59 2) Cilia/Flagella 2:52 3) Cell Membrane 3:32 4) Cytoplasm/Cytoskeleton/Centrosomes 3:58 5) Endoplasmic Reticulum 4:41 6) Ribosomes 5:45 7) Golgi Apparatus 6:00 8) Lysosomes 6:47 9) Nucleus 7:06 10) Mitochondria 9:14 TAGS: crashcourse, biology, animal cells, cell membrane, eukaryote, eukaryotic, organelle, organ, tissue, muscle, nerve, animalia, robert hooke, cilia, flagella, microtubules, cytoplasm, ctyoskeleton, centrosome, nucleus, nucleoplasm, nucleolus, endoplasmic reticulum, ribosome, amino acid, polypeptide, golgi apparatus, golgi, lysosomes, DNA, chromatin, rRNA, mRNA, mitochondria

Excerpt from:
Eukaryopolis - The City of Animal Cells: Biology #4 - Video

Public release date: 21-Feb-2012
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Contact: Rachel Jarmy
rjarmy@plos.org
44-122-344-2837
Public Library of Science

Researchers at National University of Ireland Galway have made a significant scientific discovery in the fight against Huntington's disease. The novel findings are published 21 February in the online, open access journal PLoS Biology.

Huntington's disease is an incurable, inherited, neurodegenerative disorder that causes uncontrolled movements, emotional disturbances, and severe mental deterioration. It affects over 100,000 people worldwide, with another 300,000 likely to develop symptoms in their lifetime. There is currently no way to halt progression of the disease, and available treatments are designed only to manage the symptoms.

The new research identifies specific enzymes called HDACs, or histone deacetylase complexes, as positive agents for the mutation that underlies Huntington's disease. When HDACs are active, they exacerbate the disease-causing mutation in cells, possibly contributing to the severity of the disorder. The new research found that blocking these HDACs with experimental drugs greatly reduced the risk of further mutation.

"Ongoing mutations in the brain of Huntington's patients are thought to drive progression of the disease," said Professor Robert Lahue of National University of Ireland Galway's Centre for Chromosome Biology, and lead author on the new research paper. "Our discovery suggests that inhibiting HDAC function slows down the mutation process, and thereby could slow disease progression. A key finding of the research was to pinpoint specific HDACs for selective inhibition."

Several laboratories in the United States of America are currently testing new HDAC inhibitors for efficacy and safety in laboratory models of Huntington's and other diseases. Professor Lahue and his research group hope to work with these labs to evaluate the effect of HDAC inhibitors on the mutational process.

"Huntington's is a particularly cruel disease, as it is passed from parent to child, often with increased severity or earlier onset," Professor Lahue adds. "With modern genetic testing, people can now establish whether they received the mutant gene from their parent, but then they live a waiting game for the onset of symptoms, which usually appear around the age of 40."

Professor Lahue emphasised that the HDAC inhibitors are still experimental, and that their development to potential drugs is still some way off. "It is very exciting that basic research at National University of Ireland Galway, funded by Science Foundation Ireland, has created a new possibility for helping Huntington's patients and their families."

The findings may also have implications for research into certain other neurological disorders, such as myotonic dystrophy type I, a type of muscular dystrophy caused by the same sort of mutation as seen in Huntington's.

###

Funding: This work was supported by Science Foundation Ireland (SFI; http://www.sfi.ie) grants 06/IN.1/B73 and 10/IN.1/B2973, by an SFI equipment award, and by the Millenium Fund of National University of Ireland, Galway (http://www.nuigalway.ie) (all to R.S.L.); by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Irish Research Council for Science Engineering and Technology (IRCSET, http://www.ircset.ie; to K.D.); and by an IRCSET postgraduate scholarship and by the Thomas Crawford Hayes Fund http://www.nuigalway.ie (both to A.F.). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Citation: Debacker K, Frizzell A, Gleeson O, Kirkham-McCarthy L, Mertz T, et al. (2012) Histone Deacetylase Complexes Promote Trinucleotide Repeat Expansions. PLoS Biol 10(2): e1001257. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001257

CONTACT:

Robert Lahue
National University of Ireland, Galway
Centre for Chromosome Biology
Distillery Road
Galway,
IRELAND
353-91-49-5756
Bob.Lahue@nuigalway.ie

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Read more from the original source:
New discovery in fight against Huntington's disease

One of the greatest biological threats to tropical coral reefs can be a population outbreak of crown-of-thorns (COT) sea stars (Acanthaster planci). Outbreaks can consume live corals over large areas, a change that can promote algal growth, alter reef fish populations, and reduce the aesthetic value of coral reefs, which in turn negatively affects tourism. Despite more than 30 years of research, the triggers and spread of COT outbreaks are not fully understood. Human impacts such as urbanization, runoff, and fishing have been correlated with outbreaks, but some outbreaks continue to occur in the absence of known anthropogenic triggers. Waves of a spreading outbreak that moves southerly along the Great Barrier Reef are termed secondary outbreaks because they are thought to be seeded from dispersing larvae of a primary outbreak upstream.

This secondary outbreak hypothesis has been widely accepted as the mechanism by which COT outbreaks spread across broad regions of the Pacific Ocean and impact remote locations such as Hawai'i, Guam, or French Polynesia - until now. A team of scientists from the Hawai'i Institute of Marine Biology and the Joint Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research at the University of Hawai'i and Rutgers University have recently used genetic techniques to evaluate the spatial scale at which COT outbreaks can occur via larval dispersal across the central Pacific Ocean. The results of this work have demonstrated that unlike on the Great Barrier Reef, COT larvae are not moving en masse among central Pacific archipelagos. In fact, contrary to expectations under the secondary outbreak hypothesis, all COT outbreaks in the study came from local populations. On a finer scale, genetic differences were detected among reefs around islands and even between lagoon and forereef habitats of the same island, indicating that the larvae of this species are not routinely reaching their full dispersal potential, and are certainly not fueling outbreaks at distant sites. This research has proved that outbreaks are not some rogue population that expands and ravages across central Pacific reefs. Instead, the authors hypothesize that nutrient inputs and favorable climatic and ecological conditions likely fuel outbreaks of local populations.

This work is particularly important because most current management strategies are focused on stopping secondary spread rather than preventing human activities that can start an outbreak. This study is the first genetic survey of COT populations in which both outbreak and non-outbreak populations are surveyed across a broad region of the Pacific and the results are pretty clear that outbreaks are not jumping across large expanses of open ocean. Dr. Rob Toonen, one of the researchers involved in this project, explains "the genetic differences found among COT populations clearly indicate that outbreaks are not spreading from the Hawaiian Archipelago to elsewhere. Furthermore, the similarity between outbreak and non-outbreak COT populations within each archipelago indicates that outbreaks are a local phenomenon. Our recommendation to managers is to seriously consider the role that environmental conditions and local nutrient inputs play in driving COT outbreaks."

More information: The full paper is free online at http://dx.plos.org … one.00311599

Provided by University of Hawaii

Originally posted here:
Coral-eating sea star invaders turn out to be locals

As university fees are set to rise to a staggering £9,000 a year, many people fear that out higher education institutions are going to revert to their elitist past. Yet this may not be the case and the rise in fees could actually have a beneficial impact on Britain’s educational system – leading to a decline in degree courses which offer few merits and making worthwhile courses more popular.

One such example of a worthwhile course is the study of a biology degree. Back in 2001 the recognition of this degree’s merits was high with a report in The Independent naming it the “ultimate twenty-first century degree.” Eleven years on and the subject has not fell from favour, with numerous celebrities and public icons holding a degree in this subject. Even celebrities thought to epitomise ‘cool’ are found to have useful degrees such as this with the lead singer of Californian punk-rock band The Offspring holding a masters degree in molecular biology and Friends star Lisa Kudrow holding a bachelors degree in Psychobiology.

Job prospects
Whilst high-profile celebrities may be one recommendation for degrees such as these, they are not the only attractive feature. For those interested in a worthwhile pursuit of education, job prospects are greater and this means any money paid out for fees is a worthy investment.

Major industries and areas of development provide significant job opportunities to graduates and a recent report estimated the average income of Silicon Valley to be in excess of $100,000 (approximately £63,000). Commenting on the situation, one biology major revealed that “there are quite a few bio-tech jobs and bioengineering jobs around” providing a thriving and active environment for biology graduates to enter into.

Enhancing your education
Of course, despite the attainment of such a worthy degree students are still likely to face high levels of competition and rivalry. This means that it is vital that A- Level students begin to think about ways in which they can enhance their education – with knowledge of additional languages often considered a huge benefit by both universities and employers.

With businesses and industries becoming more global, any future career or job is likely to be connected with other areas of the world and that means learning another language to accompany your biology degree could give you the edge needed to succeed in your chosen area.

Preparation is the key
Of course, the pursuit of any subject requires thorough preparation and this is why school children are encouraged to start planning their university courses in advance. To gain entry to a university course such as biology you need to meet the necessary requirements and this is likely to include previous study of the subject.

This makes undertaking biology revision vital for anyone considering this course of action, offering them the guidance and support needed to excel in such a competitive and worthwhile area of study.

Read more here:
Why biology degrees are still worthwhile