News by Subject Biology

A space-age metal that formed part of the asteroid that destroyed the dinosaurs could provide a new method of treating cancer tumors selectively using light.

Active mutations of a certain signaling receptor protein called KIT tyrosine kinase are found in several cancers, such as acute myeloid leukemia (AML). However, the different locations in the AML cells where KIT induces cancer-specific signaling remain unclear. Now, a group of scientists from Japan has aimed to answer this question by using a newly synthesized compound (along with other existing ones) that targets intracellular transport, which may offer an attractive strategy to combat cancer.

Researchers at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, disprove the prevailing theory of how DNA binds itself. It is not, as is generally believed, hydrogen bonds which bind together the 2 sides of the DNA structure. Instead, water is the key. The discovery opens doors for new understanding in research in medicine and life sciences. The researchers' findings are presented in the journal PNAS.

Cholesterol is best known in connection with cardiovascular disease, but cholesterol is also vital for many fundamental processes in the body. In an international collaboration, researchers from Aarhus University have now presented a completely new, ground-breaking model for the integration and incorporation of cholesterol into cells, with great impact on our understanding of this important process.

They can make tiny cell structures visible: cutting-edge light microscopes offer resolutions of a few tenths of a nanometre--in other words, a millionth of a millimeter. Until now, super-resolution microscopes were much slower than conventional methods, because more or finer image data had to be recorded.