University of Minnesota
Researchers have taken a significant step forward in developing a new method to produce drug compounds with potential to treat various types of cancer. In the current issue of the journal Chemistry and Biology, scientists describe the development of ''bryA,'' a gene that could help solve problems associated with the production of anticancer agents originally discovered in the marine invertebrate Bugula neritina.
A team of University of Minnesota scientists has discovered how iron- and chromium-rich rocks can generate natural gas (methane) and related hydrocarbons when reacted with superheated fluids circulating deep beneath the floor of the Atlantic Ocean. Because the process is completely nonbiological, the hydrocarbons could have been a source of ''food'' for some of the first organisms to inhabit the Earth. Also, methane is a potent greenhouse gas, and this process may have contributed to global warming early in geologic time, the researchers said.
A new medication has dramatically reduced mortality among African-American patients suffering from heart disease, according to results of a study including UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas researchers. The results were so favorable that investigators halted the multi-center trial so that all the 1,050 study participants suffering from advanced heart failure, including those on a placebo, could be given the combined drug treatment, said Dr. Clyde Yancy, a study author and director of the Congestive Heart Failure/Transplant Program at UT Southwestern/St. Paul University Medical Center
The bacteria that destroy about one-third of the potent greenhouse gas methane before it can reach the atmosphere use a neat trick to gather a key nutrient for the job. They produce a small organic compound and release it into the surrounding environment, where it ''lassos'' atoms of copper. The bacteria then reabsorb the compound and use the copper as a weapon against methane, from which they extract energy. The crystal structure of the compound--called methanobactin--will be reported in the Sept. 10 issue of Science.
Flavored, carbonated drinks have been around for about two hundred years. And their popularity continues to grow--overtaking more nutritious beverages among some age groups, especially children and adolescents. Researchers from the University of Minnesota surveyed 560 children ages 8 to 13 years old on how often they drank soft drinks and the factors that influence soft drink consumption.
Researchers have shown for the first time that gene therapy delivered to the brains of living mice can prevent the physical symptoms and neurological damage caused by an inherited neurodegenerative disease that is similar to Huntington's disease (HD).
A human protein that mutates the AIDS virus (HIV) and holds potential for keeping the disease at bay has been discovered and its function described by a team at the University of Minnesota. The new protein (called APOBEC3F) and one described previously (APOBEC3G) can directly mutate HIV. Such proteins--called retroviral restrictors--may contribute to HIV resistance in some people.
Female and male chimps both learn from their mothers how to insert sticks into termite mounds and pull out a tasty meal of insects, but females learn earlier, spend more time at it and tend to catch more termites with each try, according to a University of Minnesota study to be published in the journal Nature April 15. The distinct sex differences in learning this skill are akin to differences between young girls and boys as they learn fine motor skills like writing, the researchers said.
Women's use of all medications--including herbal supplements--is higher than anticipated, and they're unlikely to tell their health care providers about the medications they take, according to a Minnesota researcher. A new study has found that that health care providers need to spend more time asking about medication usage. "The care providers need to ask, and patients need to tell," said the lead researcher. "Neither one is doing a good job."
With the slim chance that farmers will stop planting crops containing genes from other organisms, researchers have started to develop strategies that trap these foreign genes, reducing the risk that they'll spread to wild relatives. But an investigation by scientists shows that these containment strategies can quickly fail.
Trophy hunters prize the regal lion above virtually all other animals, but shooting lions without overhunting is tricky. Excessive trophy hunting could open the door for too many young males to invade prides and kill all the cubs, causing a population decline. On the other hand, income from trophy hunting helps sustain African game reserves, which might otherwise be converted to small-scale agriculture. In an effort to reconcile the needs of lions and of people who manage their populations, University of Minnesota researchers simulated hunting using demographic data from actual lion populations. The study indicates that if hunting is limited to male lions age five and older, populations of any size can be sustained without bag limits.
Can you teach a physics class with only comic books to illustrate the principles? University of Minnesota physics professor James Kakalios has been doing it since 1995, when he explained the principle of conservation of momentum by calculating the force of Spider-Man's web when it snagged the superhero's girlfriend as she plummeted from a great height. "Comic books get their science right more often than one would expect," said the gregarious Kakalios. "I was able to find examples in superhero comic books of the correct descriptions of basic physical principles for a wide range of topics, including classical mechanics, electricity and magnetism, and even quantum physics."
To the average person, the turkey genome may seem to be a lot of "gobbledygook." But a just-published study in the journal, Genome, will help to ensure that the turkey that we "gobble down" at our Thanksgiving feasts will be a bird that is truly best of breed. For the first time, researchers from the University of Minnesota and Nicholas Turkey Breeding Farms in California have collaborated to produce the first genome map, or genetic blueprint, of the domestic turkey (Meleagris gallopavo).
A new study shows that dominant pharmaceutical firms introduce many more radical innovations than nondominant firms and that Wall Street values their innovations much more. In the October 2003 Journal of Marketing, authors Alina Sorescu of Texas A&M University, Rajesh Chandy of the University of Minnesota, and Jaideep Prabhu of Cambridge University report that more than two-thirds of radical pharmaceutical innovations come from "big-pharma" firms. Moreover, more than 70 percent of these innovations are invented in-house. During the 1991-2000 period, Glaxo SmithKline introduced the largest number of radical innovations among all pharmaceutical firms, followed by Roche and Merck.
In a river valley just southwest of Mexico City stands a small patch of teosinte - a wild, weedy grass thought to be the ancient ancestor of corn. As a gentle breeze blows gene-carrying pollen from a nearby crop of maize to its wild relative, the genetic integrity and even survival of this ancient plant and others could be jeopardized, according to new mathematical models. The models, described in the July 23 online edition of the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London and developed by scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Minnesota-St. Paul, show that genes from crops rapidly can take over those in related wild plants. The end result, say the researchers, could be major changes in the genetic make-up of wild plants, decreases in their population size and the permanent loss of natural traits that could improve crop health.
