Daily non-political popular news in brief.

Argonne scientists use unique diamond anvils to view oxide glass structures under pressure

11-09-2007 · EurekAlert!

Researchers at the US Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory have used a uniquely-constructed perforated diamond cell to investigate oxide glass structures at high pressures in unprecedented detail.

Keywords: argonne, scientists, unique, diamond, anvils, view, oxide, glass, structures, pressure, scientist, anvil, structure

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Unique partnership produces life-critical 3D structures
03-28-2007 · EurekAlert!
Most diseases are caused by malfunctions in the body’s complex protein machinery. The next generation of drugs will be designed on the basis of 3D protein models that scientists are creating. The Structural Genomics Consortium laboratory at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden has now made available the structure of PARP3, the four hundredth structure in this unique project to chart the body’s proteins.
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Advance in understanding of blood pressure gene could lead to new treatments
02-04-2007 · EurekAlert!
Research by scientists at UCL (University College London) has clearly demonstrated for the first time the structure and function of a gene crucial to the regulation of blood pressure. The discovery could be important in the search for new treatments for illnesses such as heart disease, the UK's biggest killer. In a paper published online today in Nature Medicine, the team, led by Professor Patrick Vallance and Dr James Leiper, UCL Department of Medicine, reveal the role of the human gene dimethylarginine dimethylaminohydrolase (DDAH), showing that loss of DDAH activity disrupts nitric oxide (NO) production. NO is critical in the regulation of blood pressure, nervous system functions and the immune system. The role of DDAH is to break down modified amino acids (Asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) and monomethyl arginine (L-NMMA)) that are produced by the body and have been shown to inhibit NO synthase. These molecules accumulate in various disease states including diabetes, renal failure and pulmonary and systemic hypertension, and their concentration in plasma (the fluid component of blood) is strongly predicative of cardiovascular disease and death. In a healthy human body, the majority of ADMA is eliminated through active metabolism by DDAH. Scientists have hypothesised that if DDAH function is impaired, NO production is reduced, and that this could be an important feature of increased cardiovascular risk. To examine this pathway in more detail, the researchers deleted the DDAH gene in mice. These mice went on to develop hypertension, or high blood pressure. They also designed specific inhibitors (small molecules) which bind to the active site of human DDAH. These small molecule inhibitors also induced hypertension in mice, confirming the importance of DDAH in the regulation of blood pressure. Dr Leiper, UCL Medicine, said: “These genetic and chemical approaches to disrupt DDAH showed remarkably consistent results, and provide compelling evidence that loss of DDAH function increases the concentration of ADMA and thereby disrupts vascular NO signalling. “There has been considerable scientific interest in this pathway and the role of ADMA as a novel risk factor, but so far there's been little evidence to support the idea that it's a cause of disease, rather than just a marker. Genes and their pathways are crucial to our understanding of cardiovascular disease and a better understanding of DDAH-1 could lead to important new treatments. “It could help us to establish if genetic variation predisposes certain people to these diseases, or whether environmental factors exert some of their effects through modulation of DDAH activity. “Our research also shows that this pathway could be harnessed therapeutically to limit production of NO in certain situations where too much nitric oxide is a bad thing; for example, hypotension and septic shock. These are some of the biggest problems in intensive care medicine and there is a huge unmet need for drug treatments.” The study, which was carried out at UCL's Rayne Institute, was funded by grants from the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council. Professor Jeremy Pearson, Associate Medical Director of the British Heart Foundation, said: "The unexpected finding in the 1980s that a simple gas, nitric oxide (NO), is made by cells in the blood vessel wall and is a powerful control of blood vessel relaxation led to the award of the Nobel Prize in 1998 to its discoverers. "More recently, there has been increasing evidence that impairment of NO production is likely to be an important factor in the development of heart and circulatory disease, but the mechanisms responsible are not fully understood. "This study suggests for the first time that the loss of the activity of the enzyme DDAH-1 leads to reduced NO production and may cause heart and circulatory disease. These findings are likely to be important in the search for new ways to optimise the health of our blood vessels." ### Notes for Editors 1. For more information, please contact Ruth Metcalfe in the UCL Media Relations Office on tel: +44 (0)20 7679 9739, mobile: +44 (0)7990 675 947, out of hours: +44 (0)7917 271 364, e-mail: r.metcalfe@ucl.ac.uk2. 'Disruption of methylarginine metabolism impairs vascular homeostasis' is published in the February issue of the journal Nature Medicine. Advance online publication is embargoed to 18.00 GMT (13.00 US Eastern) Sunday 4 February 2007. Journalists can obtain copies of the paper by contacting the UCL Media Relations Office.3. The study was funded by the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the Medical Research Council. About UCL Founded in 1826, UCL was the first English university established after Oxford and Cambridge, the first to admit students regardless of race, class, religion or gender, and the first to provide systematic teaching of law, architecture and medicine. In the government's most recent Research Assessment Exercise, 59 UCL departments achieved top ratings of 5* and 5, indicating research quality of international excellence. UCL is the fourth-ranked UK university in the 2006 league table of the top 500 world universities produced by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University. UCL alumni include Mahatma Gandhi (Laws 1889, Indian political and spiritual leader); Jonathan Dimbleby (Philosophy 1969, writer and television presenter); Junichiro Koizumi (Economics 1969, Prime Minister of Japan); Lord Woolf (Laws 1954, Lord Chief Justice of England & Wales); Alexander Graham Bell (Phonetics 1860s, inventor of the telephone), and members of the band Coldplay.
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Self-assembling nano-ice discovered at UNL -- Structure resembles DNA
12-11-2006 · EurekAlert!
UNL chemist Xiao Cheng Zeng and his team discovered double helixes of ice molecules that resemble the structure of DNA and self-assemble under high pressure inside carbon nanotubes. This discovery could have major implications for scientists in other fields who study the protein structures that cause diseases such as Alzheimer's and bovine spongiform ecephalitis. It could also help guide those searching for ways to target or direct self-assembly in nanomaterials.
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Cardiff University engineers give industry a moth's eye view
11-22-2007 · EurekAlert!
Scientists at Cardiff University have developed a new lens, based on the eye structure of the moth, which reflects very little light and has a wide number of industrial applications.
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Reversing cancer cells to normal cells
04-29-2007 · EurekAlert!
A Northwestern University scientist describes new research that used an innovative experimental approach to provide unique insights into how scientists can change human metastatic melanoma cells back to normal-like skin cells -- by exposing the tumor cells to the embryonic microenvironment of human embryonic stem cells, the zebra fish and the chick embryo.
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Living view in animals shows how cells decide to make proteins
11-30-2006 · EurekAlert!
Scientists at Duke University Medical Center have visualized in a living animal how cells use a critical biological process to dice and splice genetic material to create unique and varied proteins.
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From hot springs to rice farms, scientists reveal new insights into the secret lives of archaea
12-07-2006 · EurekAlert!
In the world of microbes, as in politics, some groups just can't seem to shake the label ''extremist.'' So it is with archaea, bacteria-like microorganisms whose unique genetics and chemical structure separate them from all other living things.For years, biologists have pigeonholed archaea as extremophiles: creatures that live in extreme conditions. But in the last year, scientists have begun to focus on archaeal species that inhabit more mundane environments, including soils and seawater.
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Scientists reveal structure of gateways to gene control
03-28-2007 · EurekAlert!
The first complete high-resolution map of structures that control how genes are packaged and regulated throughout an entire genome has been compiled by Penn State scientists. The research suggests how certain nucleosomes control whether a gene's function can be turned on. The study reveals an intimate relationship between the architecture of nucleosomes and the underlying DNA sequences they regulate, including a critical gateway that must be unlocked before a gene can be transcribed.
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Nuclear physicists examine oxygen's limits
09-13-2007 · EurekAlert!
Physicists at the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory at Michigan State University have made a unique measurement of an exotic oxygen nucleus, leading scientists one step closer to deciphering the behavior of the element at its limits of existence. The finding, published in Physical Review Letters, confirms a relatively new theoretical model that predicts dramatic changes in structure as one looks at heavier and heavier oxygen nuclei.
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Weizmann Institute scientists develop a general 'control switch' for protein activity
06-19-2007 · EurekAlert!
Since malfunctioning proteins can cause disease, the study of protein structure and function can lead to the development of drugs and treatments for numerous disorders. Now, Weizmann scientists have developed a unique "switch" that can control the activity of any protein, raising it several-fold or stopping it almost completely. The method provides researchers with a simple and effective tool for exploring the function of unknown proteins.
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