{"id":167431,"date":"2023-07-13T10:27:20","date_gmt":"2023-07-13T15:27:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/07\/light-activated-molecular-machines-get-cells-talking"},"modified":"2023-07-13T10:27:20","modified_gmt":"2023-07-13T15:27:20","slug":"light-activated-molecular-machines-get-cells-talking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/07\/light-activated-molecular-machines-get-cells-talking","title":{"rendered":"Light-activated molecular machines get cells \u2018talking\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<p><iframe style=\"display: block; margin: 0 auto; width: 100%; aspect-ratio: 4\/3; object-fit: contain;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ubNhBFhI8MQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope;\n   picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>One of the main ways cells \u201ctalk\u201d to each other to coordinate essential biological activities such as muscle contraction, hormone release, neuronal firing, digestion and immune activation is through calcium signaling.<\/p>\n<p>Rice University scientists have used light-activated molecular machines to trigger intercellular calcium wave signals, revealing a powerful new strategy for controlling cellular activity, according to a new study published in <i>Nature Nanotechnology<\/i>. This technology could lead to improved treatments for people with <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/heart+problems\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">heart problems<\/a>, digestive issues and more.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMost of the drugs developed up to this point use chemical binding forces to drive a specific signaling cascade in the body,\u201d said Jacob Beckham, a chemistry graduate student and lead author on the study. \u201cThis is the first demonstration that, instead of chemical force, you can use <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/mechanical+force\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">mechanical force <\/a>\u2014induced, in this case, by single-molecule nanomachines\u2014to do the same thing, which opens up a whole new chapter in drug design.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the main ways cells \u201ctalk\u201d to each other to coordinate essential biological activities such as muscle contraction, hormone release, neuronal firing, digestion and immune activation is through calcium signaling. Rice University scientists have used light-activated molecular machines to trigger intercellular calcium wave signals, revealing a powerful new strategy for controlling cellular activity, according [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,19,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-167431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-chemistry","category-nanotechnology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167431\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}