University of Wisconsin
Reading the fossil record, a paleontologist can peer into evolutionary history and see the surface features that plants and animals and, occasionally, microbes have left behind. Now, scouring the genome of a Japanese yeast, scientists have found a trackway of fossil genes in the making, providing a rare look at how an organism, in response to the demands of its environment, has changed its inner chemistry and lost the ability to metabolize a key sugar.
Mosquito abatement usually means one thing: blasting the pesky critters with pesticides. Those pesticides, although highly effective, can impair other organisms in the environment. Que Lan, insect physiologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and her colleagues in the entomology department are working on a new, more targeted approach to mosquito control: inhibiting their ability to metabolize cholesterol. Cholesterol, the sticky substance that accumulates on the lining of human arteries, is an important component of cell membranes in vertebrates and invertebrates. In mosquitoes, it is vital for growth, development and egg production.
A drug envisioned as a front-line defense for the next flu pandemic might have a genetic Achilles' heel that results in a drug-resistant influenza virus capable of infecting new human hosts, according to a new study. The study of Japanese children with influenza and treated with the antiviral drug oseltamivir was conducted by an international team of researchers led by virologist Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Tokyo. Results of the study showed that nearly 20 percent of patients treated with the drug produced mutant drug-resistant viruses as soon as four days after treatment. Moreover, patients continued to shed significant amounts of infectious viral particles even after five days of treatment with the potent antiviral agent.
While pleasurable experiences may lift your spirits, the ones that leave you with a sense of purpose and meaningful relationships may do even more: protect the body against ill health. When researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Princeton University interviewed a group of older women and assessed their emotional and physical well-being, or levels of optimal health, they found that the people who were purposefully engaged in life tended to have better levels of physical functioning.
Just because a big company owns all the media outlets in town doesn't necessarily mean newspapers and broadcast stations will look and sound alike, according to a review of the research in this area published in the summer issue of the journal Contexts. While media consolidation does have adverse effects, as described in a literature review, the reduction in content diversity does not appear to be one of them. In fact, the research suggests that media content is no less diverse than it was before the increase in consolidation of ownership.
In their desire to get close to nature by building lakeside cottages and homes in the woods, Americans may very well be hastening the decline of many native bird species that breed in forest habitats. The development boom in the nation's rural areas is putting increasing pressure on forest ecosystems, and the resulting decline in native vegetation and the increase in human activity - ranging from all-terrain vehicle use to predatory pets roaming the woods - is putting more and more native birds at risk, according to new research.
Everyone knows not to get between a mother and her offspring. What makes these females unafraid when it comes to protecting their young may be low levels of a peptide, or small piece of protein, released in the brain that normally activates fear and anxiety, according to new research published in the August issue of Behavioral Neuroscience.
By developing a computer model that mimics how children learn to read, two researchers have tracked the development of a skilled reader, ultimately showing that phonics gives readers an edge, especially early on. This finding, described in the July issue of Psychological Review, suggests that teaching young children the relationships between spellings and sounds - or phonics - not only makes learning to read easier, but also allows the flourishing of other skills that lead to faster, better reading.
As people remake the world's landscapes, cutting forests, draining wetlands, building roads and dams, and pushing the margins of cities ever outward, infectious diseases are gaining new toeholds, cropping up in new places and new hosts, and posing an ever-increasing risk to human and animal health.
Despite a roller-coaster ride of ups and downs during the past 15 years, gene therapy has continued to attract many of the world's brightest scientists. They are tantalized by the enormous potential that replacing missing genes or disabling defective ones offers for curing diseases of many kinds. One group, consisting of researchers from the University of Wisconsin Medical School, the Waisman Center at UW-Madison and Mirus Bio Corporation of Madison, Wis., now reports a critical advance relating to one of the most fundamental and challenging problems of gene therapy: how to safely and effectively get therapeutic DNA inside cells.
While the memory inside electronic devices may often be more reliable than that of humans, it, too, can worsen over time. Now a team of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Argonne National Laboratory may understand why. Smart cards, buzzers inside watches and even ultrasound machines all take advantage of ferroelectrics, a family of materials that can retain information, as well as transform electrical pulses into auditory or optical signals, or vice versa.
Some of the first data from a new orbiting infrared telescope are revealing that the Milky Way - and by analogy galaxies in general - is making new stars at a much more prolific pace than astronomers imagined. The findings from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope were announced May 27 at a NASA headquarters press briefing by Edward Churchwell, a University of Wisconsin-Madison astronomer and the leader of a team conducting the most detailed survey to date of our galaxy in infrared light.
For children growing up poor, money isn't the only solution to overcoming the challenges of poverty. According to a new study, the genes and warm support received from parents also can buffer these children against many of the cognitive and behavioral problems for which poverty puts them at risk. The findings are published in the May issue of the journal Child Development.
There is more to beauty than meets the stranger's eye, according to results from three studies examining the influence of non-physical traits on people's perception of physical attractiveness. The results, which show that people perceive physical appeal differently when they look at those they know versus strangers, are published in the recently released March issue of Evolution and Human Behavior.
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.
