Classes of transcription clusters. Credit: Nature Communications (2022) Science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke's 3rd law states that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Indika Rajapakse, Ph.D., is a believer. The engineer and mathematician now discovers himself a biologist. And he believes the charm of blending these 3 disciplines is crucial to unraveling how cells...
Mitochondria are the energy powerhouses in eukaryotic cells. One popular hypothesis claims these organelles were a pre-requisite to the transition from simpler prokaryotes like bacteria and archaea to larger, more complex eukaryotic organisms. The new study challenges this assumption. Credit: Jason Drees In the beginning, there was boredom. Following the emergence of cellular life on...
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain For decades, scientists have been seeking a catalyst that dramatically lowers the price of fabricating hydrogen fuel cells. Such an advance could trigger a green power transformation, with everything from laptops to locomotives running on a fuel whose merely byproduct is water. A new study led by the University at Buffalo indicates that...
A hairpin loop from a pre-mRNA. Highlighted are the nucleobases (green) and the ribose-phosphate backbone (blue). Note that this is a single strand of RNA that folds back upon itself. Credit: Vossman/ Wikipedia A new computational method created by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center successfully matches data from correspondent gene-expression...
The record-setting solar cell shines red under blue luminescence. Credit: Printed Electronics World. Researchers at the U.S. Division of Energy's National Renewable resource Research Laboratory (NREL) developed a solar cell with a record 39.5% performance under 1-sun global illumination. This is the greatest effective solar cell of any kind, measured using standard 1-sun problems. "The brand-new...
A 3-dimensional model of a natural killer cell (purple) with granules (yellow) attaching to a target cell (gray). A pseudo color scale shows differences in packing density of lipids on NK cell membrane, with warmer colors indicating higher density. Credit: Orange lab, CUIMC A recently uncovered fat 'guard' that avoids natural killer cells from being...
The first fully autonomous biohybrid fish from human stem-cell derived cardiac muscle cells. Credit: Michael Rosnach, Keel Yong Lee, Sung-Jin Park, Kevin Kit Parker An autonomously swimming biohybrid fish, designed to emphasize two crucial regulatory functions of the human heart, has shown the relevance of feedback mechanisms in muscle pumps (such as the heart). The...
Lynk Global team. Credit: Lynk Global Lynk Global reports that current pre-commercial tests on its fifth satellite in orbit linked it to countless unmodified devices, including mobile phones and IoT devices. Lynk's innovative approach to communication Lynk claimed in a Tuesday release that the tests were performed over five nations-- the Bahamas, Canada, New Zealand, the United...
This fluorescence microscopy image shows yeast vacuoles that have undergone phase separation. Credit: Luther Davis/Alexey Merz/University of Washington Membranes are essential to our cells. Every cell in your body is encased by one. And each of those cells contains specialized chambers, or organelles, which are similarly confined by membranes. Membranes assist cells in accomplishing tasks like...
Drug-like molecules hold great promise for developing new strategies in cancer cell therapy. Credit: Artem Podrez/ Pexels.com Drug-like molecules hold great promise for developing new strategies in cancer cell therapy. These molecules can specifically target cancer cells and disrupt their growth and proliferation, while sparing normal cells. Ten years ago, genome sequencing unveiled a...
