Lifeboat Foundation

A team of geneticists and systems biologists at Stanford University has associated 169 genes that with the production of melanin in the skin, hair and eyes. In their study, reported in the journal Science, the group conducted a flow cytometry analysis and genome-wide CRISPR screen of cell samples.

Prior research has shown that the production and distribution of melanin in the body is responsible for skin tone, hair color and eye pigmentation. Such characteristics are important for more than appearance’s sake; skin with more melanin, for example, is better able to protect against ultraviolet radiation. In this new effort, the researchers noted that while many of the genes responsible for melanin production have been identified, many more have not.

The researchers began with an effort to differentiate high and low melanin melanocytes—the cells that make melanin. They used the light-reflecting properties of melanin to sort cells in a lab dish by aiming a fluorescent lamp at them. Once they had the cells sorted, they edited them using CRISPR-Cas9. Genes were systematically mutated to switch them off and then tested to see how well the cell continued to produce melanin.

A map of all chemicals that places compounds with similar properties next to each other could speed up the process of discovery for everything from drugs to materials.

By Karmela Padavic-Callaghan

Parents who limit their kids’ screen time, it seems, may be doing them a service: a new study has found that babies who spend a lot of time looking at iPads and other screens experience developmental delays.

Published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association of Pediatrics, this new research out of Japan suggests that watching screens may limit infants’ practicing of real-life motor skills that they glean from mimicking the people near them.

In a questionnaire, the parents of the more than 7,000 kids surveyed were asked a simple question: “On a typical day, how many hours do you allow your children to watch TV, DVDs, video games, internet games (including mobile phones and tablets), etc?”

Drug development is a huge component of healthcare research that continues to grow, however, about 90% of drugs generated fail to make it to clinical trials. Drugs designed to target cancer fail due to many different obstacles including the tumor microenvironment (TME), which is the area surrounding the tumor. The TME is comprised of multiple cells generated to suppress the immune system and allow the tumor to grow. Since there are many mechanisms involved that makeup the TME, it is difficult to prescribe patients anti-cancer drugs that completely kill the tumor. Often a combination therapies are needed, but doctors run the risk of adverse side effects in patients due to toxicity of too many drugs.

Recently, a study published in eLife from Dr. Jennifer Gerton at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City, Missouri reported one critical reason why patients may experience unexpected side effects on the cellular level.

Fascinating discussion of how biotech companies (esp. Paratus) and academic researchers are leveraging the unique immunobiology of bats to find new ways of treating inflammation, cancer, infections, metabolic diseases, and more. Exploration through comparative genomic approaches as well as newly created bat iPSCs is yielding mechanistic discoveries that could inform the medicines of tomorrow. #biotech #molecularbiology #genomics #stemcells

Harnessing the unusual biology of bats, researchers aim to turn drug discovery upside-down.

Monash University researchers have uncovered why some intestinal worm infections become chronic in animal models, which could eventually lead to human vaccines and improved treatments.

Parasitic worms, also called helminths, usually infect the host by living in the gut. About a quarter of the world population is afflicted with helminth infections.

They are highly prevalent in developing countries such as sub-Saharan Africa, South America and some tropical countries in Asia. In Australia, they can be a problem in First Nations communities.

Tech executives, researchers and government officials are gathering in Seattle this week to figure out ways to add a new dimension to America’s chip industry — figuratively and literally.

“We’re going to talk about a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reinvent domestic microelectronics manufacturing,” Mark Rosker, director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Microsystems Technology Office, said today at the opening session of the ERI 2.0 Summit at the Hyatt Regency Seattle.

Continue reading “DARPA and other federal agencies work on strategies to revive America’s chip industry” »

PNP editing is emerging as a versatile and programmable tool for site-specific DNA manipulations. An innovative genome-editing technique could enhance the delivery, specificity and targeting of gene-modifying tools for treatments.

The KAUST-developed method combines two molecular technologies: a synthetic family of DNA-like molecules known as peptide nucleic acids (PNAs), and a class of DNA-cutting enzymes known as prokaryotic Argonautes (pAgos).

The PNAs first unzip and slip inside the DNA helix. The pAgos, guided by short fragments of genetic material, then bind the loosened helix at specific target sequences and nick each opposing strand of DNA.

Even though we may actually sound more like our recorded voice to others, I think the reason so many of us squirm upon hearing it is not that the recorded voice is necessarily worse than our perceived voice. Instead, we’re simply more used to hearing ourselves sound a certain way.

A study published in 2005 had patients with voice problems rate their own voices when presented with recordings of them. They also had clinicians rate the voices. The researchers found that patients, across the board, tended to more negatively rate the quality of their recorded voice compared with the objective assessments of clinicians.

So if the voice in your head castigates the voice coming out of a recording device, it’s probably your inner critic overreacting – and you’re judging yourself a bit too harshly.