Genetics & Molecular Biology

A discovery has allowed researchers to attribute two types of tumor almost entirely to specific mutations that lie in two related genes. These mutations are found in nearly 100 percent of patients suffering from two rare bone tumors; chondroblastoma and giant cell tumor of the bone. Chondroblastoma and giant cell tumor of bone are benign bone tumors that primarily affect adolescents and young adults, respectively. They can be extremely debilitating tumors and recur despite surgery. Occasionally, these tumors can be difficult to differentiate from highly malignant bone cancers. The mutations…

Obesity, along with diabetes and associated consequences like cardiovascular, neurological and renal diseases, is increasing worldwide. Along with focusing on smarting eating, research is on to understand the biological mechanisms.   In obesity, fatty acids, derived mostly from adipose tissue, alter lipid metabolism in other tissues such as liver and skeletal muscles. Both impaired fatty acid metabolism and glucose are hallmarks of diabetes. In a recent study in the journal Biochemistry, a research group applied fluorescent methods to measure the rate by which fatty acids bind to…

The endogenous hormone dopamine, induced by joyful classics as sex, drugs and food , triggers feelings of happiness - but that is not all. It remembers the state of happiness and keeps wanting to achieve it again. Dopamine enables us to make the "right" decisions in order to experience even more moments of happiness.  Dopamine, which circulates in the blood serum, regulates the breathing and the blood sugar balance. It has been believed that the activities of brain and serum dopamine are connected.   Now, a team of researchers has discovered a way to use the body's dopamine system…

Research using DNA to map the history of human migration is helping unravel the timing and source of human settlement in Central Europe. One of the great debates in archaeological research for the past century has been the degree to which cultures or people move. When you see a pronounced cultural shift in the archaeological record, for instance, is it because of a new people appearing on the scene, or is it simply the diffusion of a new culture? This new Genographic study shows definitively that, for Germany over a four-millennia-long time span from 5500 B.C. to 1500 B.C., it was people who…

Atrial fibrillation, the most frequently diagnosed type of irregular heart rhythm, is more prevalent in whites than people from other race or ethnic groups, according to researchers at UC San Francisco.  Atrial fibrillation is the most common cardiac arrhythmia. People over 40 years of age have a 26 percent lifetime risk of developing this abnormality, according to the Framingham Heart Study. They drew their conclusion by examining the records of 14 million California patients who visited the emergency room, had outpatient services, or were hospitalized between 2005 and 2009. The…

As with any new technology, the development and commercialization of biotech crops is a story about people.  Its a story about people with ideas and vision; people who did hard and creative work; people who took career or business risks, and people who integrated this new technology into the complex business of farming.  By various artifacts of my educational and career path, I've been in a position to know many of these people as friends and colleagues over the last 36 years.  Their story is important, but it tends to get lost in much of the conversation about biotech crops.…

Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) is the name given to women who are in a bad mood when they are about to get their periods.  Most women are unaffected by the hormonal changes of the menstrual cycle, but approximately 20% of women say they experience premenstrual syndrome and 5% say they have a severe disorder characterized by functionally impairing or distressing mood and physical symptoms in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle (second half of cycle) - which scholars call premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), a more severe form of PMS.   Hallmark mood symptoms include mood…

10 percent of the US is left handed and that is a similar ratio to many populations around the world so it would seem to be biological. But a new paper in the journal Heredity has ruled out a 'strong genetic determinant' in influencing handedness.  Professor John Armour, Dr. Angus Davison (both The University of Nottingham) and Professor Chris McManus (University College London) conducted a twin study examining the whole genome of nearly 4,000 subjects from the London Twin Research Unit to compare left and right handed participants.  They were unable to find a strong…

Researchers have created the first comprehensive roadmap of the protein interactions that enable cells in the pancreas to produce, store and secrete the hormone insulin. The finding makes possible a deeper scientific understanding of the insulin secretion process—and how it fails in insulin disorders such as type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes and a similar insulin-related condition known as metabolic syndrome currently affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide. One of the common features of these conditions as the disease develops is the inability of the secretion of insulin by the…

I am 99.9% sure that there will never be commercial production of genetically engineered wine grapes ("GMO" to use the common misnomer). Even so, I'd like to indulge in imagining what could be if we lived in some parallel universe where rational scientific thinking prevailed. Wine grapes are an extremely logical crop for genetic engineering because there is no tolerance for changing varieties. For annual crops like grains or vegetables, new varieties are bred on a regular basis to solve pest issues or to improve features like taste or shelf life. Breeding of perennial fruit crops is a much…