Daily Archives: May 4, 2017

May 4, 2017

A new study in Science from Karolinska Institutet maps out how different DNA-binding proteins in human cells react to certain biochemical modifications of the DNA molecule. The scientists report that some 'master' regulatory proteins can activate regions of the genome that are normally inactive due to epigenetic changes. Their findings contribute to a better understanding of gene regulation, embryonic development and the processes leading to diseases such as cancer.

The DNA molecule carries information in the form of a sequence of four nucleotide bases, adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G) and thymine (T), which can be thought of as the letters of the genomic language. Short sequences of the letters form 'DNA words' that determine when and where proteins are made in the body.

Almost all of the cells in the human body contain the letters in precisely the same order. Different genes are however active (expressed) in different cell types, allowing the cells to function in their specialised roles, for example as a brain cell or a muscle cell. The key to this gene regulation lies in specialised DNA-binding proteinstranscription factorsthat bind to the sequences and activate or repress gene activity.

The DNA letter C exists in two forms, cytosine and methylcytosine, which can be thought of as the same letter with and without an accent (C and ). Methylation of DNA bases is a type of epigenetic modification, a biochemical change in the genome that does not alter the DNA sequence. The two variants of C have no effect on the kind of proteins that can be made, but they can have a major influence on when and where the proteins are produced. Previous research has shown that genomic regions where C is methylated are commonly inactive, and that many transcription factors are unable to bind to sequences that contain the methylated .

By analysing hundreds of different human transcription factors, researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have now found that certain transcription factors actually prefer the methylated . These include transcription factors that are important in embryonic development, and for the development of prostate and colorectal cancers.

"The results suggest that such 'master' regulatory factors could activate regions of the genome that are normally inactive, leading to the formation of organs during development, or the initiation of pathological changes in cells that lead to diseases such as cancer", says Professor Jussi Taipale at Karolinska Institutet's Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics who led the research.

The results pave the way for cracking the genetic code that controls the expression of genes, and will have broad implications for the understanding of development and disease. The availability of genomic information relevant to disease is expanding at an exponentially increasing rate.

"This study identifies how the modification of the DNA structure affects the binding of transcription factors, and this increases our understanding of how genes are regulated in cells and further aids us in deciphering the grammar written into DNA", says Professor Taipale.

Explore further: Complex grammar of the genomic language

More information: Yimeng Yin, Ekaterina Morgunova, Arttu Jolma, Eevi Kaasinen, Biswajyoti Sahu, Syed Khund-Sayeed, Pratyush K. Das, Teemu Kivioja, Kashyap Dave, Fan Zhong, Kazuhiro R. Nitta, Minna Taipale, Alexander Popov, Paul A. Ginno, Silvia Domcke, Jian Yan, Dirk Schbeler, Charles Vinson, and Jussi Taipale. 'Impact of cytosine methylation on DNA binding specificities of human transcription factors'. Science, 5 May 2017. science.sciencemag.org/cgi/doi/10.1126/science.aaj2239

Journal reference: Science

Provided by: Karolinska Institutet

A new study from Sweden's Karolinska Institutet shows that the 'grammar' of the human genetic code is more complex than that of even the most intricately constructed spoken languages in the world. The findings, published ...

Scientists at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have made a large step towards the understanding of how human genes are regulated. In a new study, published in the journal Cell, they identified the DNA sequences that bind to ...

In a study published in Nature, Dirk Schbeler and his group at the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research (FMI) describe how the interplay between transcription factors and epigenetic modifications of DNA ...

Using human cells, they have mapped how different proteins bind along the DNA to control which genes are active during barrier formation.

"Human satellite II," an exceptionally high-copy but unexplored sequence of the human genome thought of as "junk DNA," has a surprising ability to impact master regulators of our genome, and it goes awry in 50 percent of ...

The cells in our bodies can divide as often as once every 24 hours, creating a new, identical copy. DNA binding proteins called transcription factors are required for maintaining cell identity. They ensure that daughter cells ...

Protected areas in the United States, representing 14 percent of the land mass, provide places for respite, recreation, and natural resource conservation. However, noise pollution poses novel threats to these protected areas, ...

A new study in Science from Karolinska Institutet maps out how different DNA-binding proteins in human cells react to certain biochemical modifications of the DNA molecule. The scientists report that some 'master' regulatory ...

University of California, Berkeley, researchers have described 10 new CRISPR enzymes that, once activated, behave like Pac-Man to chew up RNA in a way that could be used as sensitive detectors of infectious viruses.

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have discovered a new mechanism that could explain how the Merkel Cell Polyomavirus, responsible for the most aggressive form of skin cancer, can stay dormant for decades after ...

One of humankind's oldest industrial partners is yeast, a familiar microbe that enabled early societies to brew beer and leaven bread and empowers modern ones to synthesize biofuels and conduct key biomedical research. Yeast ...

The synthetic biologists from Imperial College London have re-engineered yeast cells to manufacture the nonribosomal peptide antibiotic penicillin. In laboratory experiments, they were able to demonstrate that this yeast ...

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Scientists reveal how epigenetic changes in DNA are interpreted - Phys.Org

Discovering that your German heritage is actually Scottish and turning in your lederhosen for a kilt thats the premise of a commercial playing a lot these days. It taps into a common human desire: to find out our true identity. Or perhaps, more specifically, to find out were a little more interesting than we thought or that our ancestors were.

Only its not so easy, or precise, as the commercials suggest.

Colleen Greene, Cal State Fullerton marketing librarian, shared advice with a roomful of people on National DNA Day last month on using DNA testing to research their ancestry. She also told them how to choose from among the DNA kits on the market to find the one that best fits their goals and how to save money in the process.

People expect it to tell them their whole family history. Theyve seen the commercials. Theyve seen the guy in the kilt, Greene said. They all want to find out theyre related to William Wallace, the Scottish knight of Braveheart fame, she joked.

Most wont, of course. But Greene related how she started piecing together her own heritage a couple of years ago and has connected with multiple relatives by using the kits and the tools on the websites for Ancestry.com, 23andMe and Family Tree DNA.

Greene, who teaches an online graduate-level genealogy seminar through San Jose State University, stressed that those really interested in going down their personal rabbit hole must combine DNA testing with historical research.

Many in the audience, which included members of CSUFs Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, had already done some DNA testing. A little testing can evidently lead to more testing, more research and more contacts with long-lost relatives; several sites include avenues to email those who match your DNA.

The interest in testing has soared as the cost of DNA kits has come down. What once cost $500 to $1,000 a pop, Greene said, now can be found for less than $100.

Also, the technology has been progressing quickly, allowing more detailed and accurate results. Two books published just last year dont reflect the latest changes, she said. One DNA kit maker recently changed its algorithms, thereby changing peoples results.

AncestryDNA gained more than a million members just over the holiday season, due partly to a heavy advertising campaign, Greene said.

But that increased visibility and the surge in commercials is leading to some confusion, Greene said. Which kit you go with, and from which company, depends on what you are hoping to find out. Do you want to learn the identity of your great-grandfather who emigrated from Scotland or just find out whether you should buy a kilt, like the guy in the commercial?

If you are investing money in a kit, you want to make sure youre getting the right one not the $500 one but the $79 one, Greene said.

The two main goals are to find out family history or ethnicity, she said. Ethnicity is what most people are after when they ponder ordering a kit.

These are the people who really dont care about their family history, Greene said. They dont care about their ancestors. They want to know their ethnicity. This is one of the most consuming things.

Most of us dont know our ethnicity, she said. We just think we know, based on our appearance or what mom and dad told us.But depending on what country they came from, parents and grandparents dont always want to talk about such things. Perhaps they fled a country in revolution or under occupation.

Ethnicities also get a little cloudy due to migrations, such as that of the Sephardic Jews, and intermarriage between groups, such as in Mexico. Some groups just have more meager historical records, such as Hispanics and pre-Civil War African Americans. And others, such as Native Americans, are classified various ways, adding to the confusion.

A lot of family trees online are junk, Greene said. Results for many Latinos dont come back as Mexican, she said, because the kits test race and Mexicans are a diverse race. Also, many names include two surnames.

On the other hand, New Mexico, which has some of the oldest settlements in the nation, has conducted statewide tests to compile a comprehensive DNA database. That wealth of information helped Greene track down some of her relatives.

Those wanting to learn their ethnicity should look for an autosomal DNA kit, Greene said, which is typically the least expensive kind. It goes back only about five or six generations, however.

More distant or complicated searches for ancestors require either a Y-DNA kit, which tests the patrilineal line, or a mitochondrial or mtDNA kit, which tests the matrilineal line. These are more expensive and often require sleuthing out a male or female relative to test, but provide results such as those that confirmed descendants of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings or identified the remains of King Richard III.

Its really fun if you love puzzles, Greene said. You have to weave back. In the case of confirming that remains found in 2012 under a parking lot in Leicester, England, were indeed those of Richard III, researchers had to trace the lineage through his eldest sister using mitochondrial DNA.

Often DNA cant prove something alone, Greene said. DNA results have to be combined with historical records. Jefferson kept meticulous records and journals, for example, which allowed researchers to determine that his younger brother Randolph wasnt near Monticello at the time the children in question wereconceived, leaving Thomas as the more likely candidate as their father.

Greene used obituaries, newspaper articles, and military, border crossing and naturalization records to track down some of her ancestors.

Her own search and those she does for others have taught Greene that DNA testing is rife with the potential for uncomfortable family secrets and other privacy concerns.

You have to anticipate you will find something, she said, especially with searches of family history. Imagine someone finding out her parents werent really her biological parents or a white supremacist finding out he has African American DNA, and its easy to see how things can get messy, she said.

It can be really surprising to get these results. she said.

***

DNA science about siblings an eye-opener

Heres a little bit of science for those whose sibling takes a DNA test and think they can piggyback on the findings: Siblings other than identical twins dont share the same distribution of their parents DNA, and so can have slightly different percentages of ethnicity. Colleen Greene mentioned one family in which a man had 17 percent Irish heritage vs. 34 percent for his older sisters. They would call him their almost Irish brother. Think of a jar of M&Ms, Greene said. Toss in half from mom and half from dad, shake them up and take a handful. The assortment of M&Ms that you and your sibling pull out will be different, unless you are identical twins. It really confuses people, she said.

***

More on testing

CSUFs Pollak Library website includes information from Colleen Greene on the most popular DNA kits on the market and which to buy for various purposes. Some makers sites include information on genetic health risks or allow you to compare chromosomes of your relatives. Go to Library Guides and search for DNA. Greene plans a monthly interest group for those interested in tracing their family roots and, next spring, CSUF staff will launch a program series on the topic.

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What can a DNA kit tell you? A CSUF expert has some answers - OCRegister

KTVB , KTVB 5:59 PM. MDT May 03, 2017

DNA sketch of Angie Dodge's killer (Photo: Idaho Falls Police)

IDAHO FALLS -- Two decades after 18-year-old Angie Dodge was raped and stabbed to death in her Idaho Falls apartment, police are leveraging DNA technology to get their first tentative look at the killer's face.

The DNA profile sketch, released Wednesday, was made possible by Parabon Nanolabs, a Virginiabased DNA technology company. Although no match has been found for the DNA on Dodge's body after the 1996 slaying, the company was able to use the killer's genetic material to determine his likely hair, eye and skin color.

One of the profiles shows the suspect at about age 25, while the other shows how he would look age-progressed to his forties - believed to be the killer's current age.

According to the sketch, the man who killed Dodge has brown eyes, brown or blond hair, and a normal body mass index.The suspect is white with skin that is fair or very fair, and of northern European ancestry, the profile suggests.

MORE: Tapp released from prison after 20 years

The information released in the DNA snapshot may not be 100 percent accurate, Parabon Nanolabs says. But the Idaho Falls Police Departmetnt believes it may get detectives a step closer to finding the killer who has eluded justice in Dodge's death.

In a statement, Idaho Falls Police Chief Mark McBride said detectives are committed to getting an answer, no matter how long it takes.

The Idaho Falls Police Department has spent more time and money investigating this crime than any other crime in the history of this department, he said. But the resources directed to this case are quintessential to solving it, and we are determined to bring a resolution to this heinous crime. We owe it to the Dodge family and our citizens and therefore, this case will remain as high of a priority as it has been since 1996.

Police say two DNA profiles were collected at the crime scene, indicating that more than one person was involved in the attack. Under current technology, only one of the two samples was viable to be tested.

That testing was integral in getting former Idaho Falls resident Chris Tapp released from prison after 20 years behind bars. Tapp, who prosecutors had said held Dodge down while another man sexually assaulted and killed her, has long maintained he was coerced into signing a false confession.

RELATED: Looking at DNA technology used in Tapp case, release

Tapp's convictions were not overturned, but a judge resentenced him to time served and ordered him released from prison in March amid doubts about whether he was connected to the crime. Even the murdered teen's mother, Carol Dodge, had joined activists and the Idaho Innocence Project in calling for Tapp's release.

In an interview with KTVB after his release last month, Tapp said he still did not want anyone to forget about the cold case.

Everybody is excited and happy that I'm released and free, but also on the other side of the coin theyre forgetting the most important thing: There's still an unsolved murder," he said.

Idaho Falls Police and Channel Blend of Idaho Falls have set up a 24-hour tipline for anyone who recognizes the man in the DNA profile sketch or knows anything about the murder.

The tipline number is 18009271239. Callers can leave tips anonymously, or an provide a name and contact information for a callback from detectives. Every tip will be followed up on by detectives, police say.

Police say the department has already spent more than $43,000 in evidence extraction, analysis, DNA profiling, and travel to follow up on leads over the past four years, as well as staffing and overtime assigned to the case.

"This is a testament of our commitment and desire to utilize available and cuttingedge technologies to finding our killer," McBride said. "We are hopeful and excited this new phenotype sketch will help us garner new leads into the Dodge homicide."

2017 KTVB-TV

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DNA provides sketch of Idaho Falls cold-case killer | KTVB.COM - KTVB

In Brief Scientists are now able to retrieve and analyze the DNA of ancient human ancestors from sediment, opening up a world of possibility for exploring early human evolution in the absence of fossils and bones. The Dirt on DNA

German scientists just made a major breakthrough in sequencing the DNA of our ancient ancestors. While researchers have long relied on painstaking work and pure good luck to uncover the fossilized remains of our predecessors, a new technique has allowed scientists to pull DNA from something far more abundant: dirt.

Scientists have understood for years that genetic material from a decomposing entity whether animal, plant, or human is released into the surrounding sediment and can remain there for a long time. The problem is theres a lot of it and its all mixed up. Parsing out only human DNA deposits from even a tablespoon of dirt has traditionally been very difficult to do.

Led by Viviane Slon, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have developed a process for retrieving and sequencing those DNA deposits, and they are now the first researchers to recover ancient human DNA directly from sediment. To do so, they created molecules that would target and extract DNA from mammals, specifically mitochondrial DNA, which is more abundant.The team presented its findings in the journal Science last week.

Slons team shines a new light onthe Denisovans,a cousin to our Neanderthal ancestors that we know very little about. So far, scientists have only recovered a fossilized finger bone and a couple of teeth, both of which came from a single cave in Siberia. If the technique for analyzing DNA from dirt becomes a regular part of field work, theres the potential for discovering more evidence of this ancient ancestor in places without fossils. It will teach us more about what early humans were doing outside of the cavesin which they lived (and apparently died), including migratory information.

For paleontologists and archeologists, the prospect of no longer having to rely quite so heavily on the exciting but relatively rare discovery of fossils will likely come as a relief. Even when they are able to find a fossil, putting it through the paces for sequencing can compromise its integrity as a specimen, making researchers no friend to museum curators or civilizations looking to preserve the remains of their ancient ancestors.

Perhaps most exciting of all, though, is the fact that being able to retrieve DNA in the absence of bones could add new branches to humanitys family tree, giving researchers insight into early humans that we have yet to find skeletal evidence of.

Read more here:
Scientists Can Now Extract Ancient Human DNA From 240,000-Year ... - Futurism

May 4, 2017 by Matt Williams, Universe Today An interdisciplinary team from MIT (with support from NASA) is seeking to create an instrument that can performing in-situ test for life. Credit: setg.mit.edu

In 2015, then-NASA Chief Scientist Ellen Stofan stated that, "I believe we are going to have strong indications of life beyond Earth in the next decade and definite evidence in the next 10 to 20 years." With multiple missions scheduled to search foe evidence of life (past and present) on Mars and in the outer solar system, this hardly seems like an unrealistic appraisal.

But of course, finding evidence of life is no easy task. In addition to concerns over contamination, there is also the and the hazards the comes with operating in extreme environments which looking for life in the solar system will certainly involve. All of these concerns were raised at a new FISO conference titled "Towards In-Situ Sequencing for Life Detection", hosted by Christopher Carr of MIT.

Carr is a research scientist with MIT's Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) and a Research Fellow with the Department of Molecular Biology at Massachusetts General Hospital. For almost 20 years, he has dedicated himself to the study of life and the search for it on other planets. Hence why he is also the science principal investigator (PI) of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Genomes (SETG) instrument.

Led by Dr. Maria T. Zuber the E. A. Griswold Professor of Geophysics at MIT and the head of EAPS the inter-disciplinary group behind SETG includes researchers and scientists from MIT, Caltech, Brown University, arvard, and Claremont Biosolutions. With support from NASA, the SETG team has been working towards the development of a system that can test for life in-situ.

Introducing the search for extra-terrestrial life, Carr described the basic approach as follows:

"We could look for life as we don't know it. But I think it's important to start from life as we know it to extract both properties of life and features of life, and consider whether we should be looking for life as we know it as well, in the context of searching for life beyond Earth."

Towards this end, the SETG team seeks to leverage recent developments in in-situ biological testing to create an instrument that can be used by robotic missions. These developments include the creation of portable DNA/RNA testing devices like the MinION, as well as the Biomolecule Sequencer investigation. Performed by astronaut Kate Rubin in 2016, this was first-ever DNA sequencing to take place aboard the International Space Station.

Building on these, and the upcoming Genes in Space program which will allow ISS crews to sequence and research DNA samples on site the SETG team is looking to create an instrument that can isolate, detect, and classify any DNA or RNA-based organisms in extra-terrestrial environments. In the process, it will allow scientists to test the hypothesis that life on Mars and other locations in the solar system (if it exists) is related to life on Earth.

To break this hypothesis down, it is a widely accepted theory that the synthesis of complex organics which includes nucleobases and ribose precursors occurred early in the history of the solar system and took place within the Solar nebula from which the planets all formed. These organics may have then been delivered by comets and meteorites to multiple potentially-habitable zones during the Late Heavy Bombardment period.

Known as lithopansermia, this theory is a slight twist on the idea that life is distributed throughout the cosmos by comets, asteroids and planetoids (aka. panspermia). In the case of Earth and Mars, evidence that life might be related is based in part on meteorite samples that are known to have come to Earth from the Red Planet. These were themselves the product of asteroids striking Mars and kicking up ejecta that was eventually captured by Earth.

By investigating locations like Mars, Europa and Enceladus, scientists will also be able to engage in a more direct approach when it comes to searching for life. As Carr explained:

"There's a couple main approaches. We can take an indirect approach, looking at some of the recently identified exoplanets. And the hope is that with the James Webb Space Telescope and other ground-based telescopes and space-based telescopes, that we will be in a position to begin imaging the atmospheres of exoplanets in much greater detail than characterization of those exoplanets has [allowed for] to date. And that will give us high-end, it will give the ability to look at many different potential worlds. But it's not going to allow us to go there. And we will only have indirect evidence through, for example, atmospheric spectra."

Mars, Europa and Enceladus present a direct opportunity to find life since all have demonstrated conditions that are (or were) conducive to life. Whereas there is ample evidence that Mars once had liquid water on its surface, Europa and Enceladus both have subsurface oceans and have shown evidence of being geologically active. Hence, any mission to these worlds would be tasked with looking in the right locations to spot evidence of life.

On Mars, Carr notes, this will come down to looking in places there there is a water-cycle, and will likely involve some a little spelunking:

"I think our best bet is to access the subsurface. And this is very hard. We need to drill, or otherwise access regions below the reach of space radiation which could destroy organic materiel. And one possibility is to go to fresh impact craters. These impact craters could expose material that wasn't radiation-processed. And maybe a region where we might want to go would be somewhere where a fresh impact crater could connect to a deeper subsurface network where we could get access to material perhaps coming out of the subsurface. I think that is probably our best bet for finding life on Mars today at the moment. And one place we could look would be within caves; for example, a lava tube or some other kind of cave system that could offer UV-radiation shielding and maybe also provide some access to deeper regions within the Martian surface."

As for "ocean worlds" like Enceladus, looking for signs of life would likely involve exploring around its southern polar region where tall plumes of water have been observed and studied in the past. On Europa, it would likely involve seeking out "chaos regions", the spots where there may be interactions between the surface ice and the interior ocean.

Exploring these environments naturally presents some serious engineering challenges. For starters, it would require the extensive planetary protections to ensure that contamination was prevented. These protections would also be necessary to ensure that false positives were avoided. Nothing worse than discovering a strain of DNA on another astronomical body, only to realize that it was actually a skin flake that fell into the scanner before launch!

And then there are the difficulties posed by operating a robotic mission in an extreme environment. On Mars, there is always the issue of solar radiation and dust storms. But on Europa, there is the added danger posed by Jupiter's intense magnetic environment. Exploring water plumes coming from Enceladus is also very challenging for an orbiter that would most likely be speeding past the planet at the time.

But given the potential for scientific breakthroughs, such a mission it is well worth the aches and pains. Not only would it allow astronomers to test theories about the evolution and distribution of life in our solar system, it could also facilitate the development of crucial space exploration technologies, and result in some serious commercial applications.

Looking to the future, advances in synthetic biology are expected to lead to new treatments for diseases and the ability to 3-D print biological tissues (aka. "bioprinting"). It will also help ensure human health in space by addressing bone density loss, muscle atrophy, and diminished organ and immune-function. And then there's the ability to grow organisms specially-designed for life on other planets (can you say terraforming?)

On top of all that, the ability to conduct in-situ searches for life on other Solar planets also presents scientists with the opportunity to answer a burning question, one which they've struggled with for decades. In short, is carbon-based life universal? So far, any and all attempts to answer this question have been largely theoretical and have involved the "low hanging fruit variety" where we have looked for signs of life as we know it, using mainly indirect methods.

By finding examples that come from environments other than Earth, we would be taking some crucial steps towards preparing ourselves for the kinds of "close encounters" that could be happening down the road.

Explore further: The search for extraterrestrial life in the water worlds close to home

The discovery of seven exoplanets around a star 40 light years from our Sun has raised the possibility that they could harbour life.

Chile's Atacama desert may seem to contain little besides red-grey rocks and sandbut scientists are busy searching here for clues to life in a place it much resembles: Mars.

Researchers have invented a range of instruments from giant telescopes to rovers to search for life in outer space, but so far, these efforts have yielded no definitive evidence that it exists beyond Earth. Now scientists ...

A report on the potential science value of a lander on the surface of Jupiter's icy moon Europa has been delivered to NASA, and the agency is now engaging the broader science community to open a discussion about its findings.

Astrobiologist alumna Alexandra Pontefract, PhD'13 (Geology), knows finding DNA on the Red Planet will be no easy feat. But it is possible. What's more, if DNA is found, it's not far-fetched to think it would be proof of ...

Earlier this week, NASA hosted the "Planetary Science Vision 2050 Workshop" at their headquarters in Washington, DC. Running from Monday to Wednesday February 27th to March 1st the purpose of this workshop was to ...

(Phys.org)A "hot Jupiter" exoplanet transiting a rapidly rotating star has been discovered jointly by WASP and KELT survey, a new study reveals. The newly found alien world, designated WASP-167b/KELT-13b, is several times ...

Much like the eclectic group of space rebels in the upcoming film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has some amazing superpowers, specifically when it comes to observing innumerable galaxies flung ...

A new movie sequence of images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows the view as the spacecraft swooped over Saturn during the first of its Grand Finale dives between the planet and its rings on April 26.

(Phys.org)Russian scientists have presented the first results of solar observations made with the new radioheliograph of the Siberian Solar Radio Telescope (SSRT). The Siberian Radioheliograph (SRH), has recently commenced ...

VISTA's infrared capabilities have now allowed astronomers to see the myriad of stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud galaxy much more clearly than ever before. The result is this record-breaking imagethe biggest infrared ...

A mysterious gamma-ray glow at the center of the Milky Way is most likely caused by pulsars the incredibly dense, rapidly spinning cores of collapsed ancient stars that were up to 30 times more massive than the sun. That's ...

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Building rovers that can detect life and sequence DNA on other worlds - Phys.Org

Some Mothers Boy, killed in a train accident nearly a century ago and buried as an unknown in a Georgetown cemetery, is finally coming home to rest beside his mother and father.

Results of DNA tests are about a month away, but the Haynes family in Pulaski County seems assured Frank A. Haynes, interred for 96 years, is one of them. They are planning to bring his scant remains, exhumed in March, back home to be buried beside his parents in the Newell cemetery at Bronston.

Haynes, 19, was killed in a train accident in Georgetown April 1, 1921. His head apparently was mutilated by wheels on the train as he and a companion attempted to switch directions by jumping from one train to another.

Some newspapers in the area identified Haynes a short time after his death, but no official identification was made and he was buried as an unknown. Communication during the early 20th century was mainly word of mouth and distance between the accident site in Georgetown and his family in Bronston was light years apart.

Someone, somebody, put up a tombstone inscribed: Some Mothers Boy/Killed/April 1, 1921/Interred/April 14, 1921/Contributed by Friends.

Haynes death was legend among members of the Haynes family during the past century. His many relatives in Bronston, Burnside and Somerset knew he was killed by a train; the story was told time and time again. However, they didnt know his burial place until recent publicity surrounding an investigation by J. Todd Matthews, director, Case Management and Communications, National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs).

Efforts by Matthews and NamUs generated publicity that informed relatives in this area where the body was buried. Initially, as recent stories surfaced, Haynes age was given as 17. However, Frank M. Haynes, a nephew who lives at 51 Muncey Lane, Somerset, said family Bible records list the dead mans birthdate as March 2, 1902, making him 19 when he was killed.

My father, Fred, told me the story many times, said Frank M. Haynes. He (Frank A. Haynes) and another boy jumped a train in Burnside. For some reason, at Georgetown, they decided to switch directions.

Both boys jumped from the northbound train to a southbound train (Royal Palm). The other boy made the jump. Frank didnt. The train ran over his head, probably leaving him unidentifiable, said Frank M. Haynes.

The dead boys companion reportedly was detained in Somerset for questioning. However, his name was not recorded and nobody knows who he was or where he went.

Matthews was in Somerset Tuesday to collect female DNA samples from Mamie Hahn, a niece who lives in Twin Lakes subdivision at Bronston. Originally, plans were to take a DNA sample from Margaret Haynes Bell, another niece from Burnside. However, Matthews explained it was necessary to get the sample from Hahn on the dead boys maternal side. Members of the family gathered Tuesday in the Wal-Mart parking lot where DNA and FRS (Family Reference Samples) were taken.

A family spokesperson said Richard New, manager of Southern Oaks Funeral Home, will provide an appropriate container in which to bury the few bones and teeth that remain in the grave after 96 years.

Frank A. Haynes was one of 12 children of Frank Haynes Jr. and Mignona Haynes of Bronston.

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DNA is helping solve 96-year-old mystery - Commonwealth Journal's History