Diatom genome reveals key role in biosphere's carbon cycle
...iscovered they have a urea cycle, something no one ever suspected," Armbrust says. A urea cycle is a nitrogen waste pathway found in animals and has never before been seen in a photosynthetic eukaryote like a diatom, she says. Nitrogen is crucial for diatom growth and is often in short supply in seawater,...Time running out for South Asian vultures, ecologists warn
...e vulture declines, which are among the most rapid ever recorded for any wild bird. Time is running out if we are to save these species. Governments, drug companies, vets, livestock owners and conservationists should act together now to solve this problem." The research builds upon a study by Lindsay Oaks...National Science Foundation awards $2 million grant to UC Riverside
...ch begins Oct. 1, is the largest study of its kind ever attempted, said principal investigator Edith Allen, a professor in the UCR Department of Botany and Plant Sciences. She will lead a team of UC Riverside and UC Berkeley researchers who will monitor weed growth in the state, and make appropriate recom...HHMI researchers Richard Axel and Linda Buck win 2004 Nobel Prize
...s in 1991, I couldn't believe it! None of them had ever been seen before. They were all different but all related to each other. That was very satisfying." The discovery made it possible to study the sense of smell with the techniques of modern molecular and cell biology and to explore how the brain discr...New risks for bladder cancer identified by MIT team
...mokers. And except for one, none of those nine had ever been investigated before" for their potential carcinogenic activity, Tannenbaum said. ...Rutgers-led research offers new clues in the genetic mysteries of maize
... the most comprehensive survey of the maize genome ever performed and established for the first time the genome's magnitude approximately 59,000 genes and the relative position of the genes. This is twice as many as the human genome and the highest number of genes of any genome sequenced to date. Messin...Touching research: How white blood cells navigate
...more information than other forms of communication ever can. It turns out the same is true inside our bodies, where just the right touch among blood cells can mean the difference between good health and chronic conditions like heart disease and diabetes. The power of touch among blood cells is the focus ...Amphibians in dramatic decline; Up to 122 extinct since 1980
...century, according to the most comprehensive study ever conducted. More than 500 scientists from over 60 nations contributed to the Global Amphibian Assessment, the key findings of which were published on-line by Science Express this afternoon, and will appear within the next few weeks in the journal Sci...Arctic mystery no longer: Dinosaurs walked Canada's great north
...it remained an unproven theory, since no bones had ever been uncovered. Not anymore. Larsson has discovered tyrannosaurus dinosaur bones, which until now, had only been located in Canada's Prairie Provinces, as well as in the Western United States. "We were able to clarify that dinosaurs large predatory ...The long road to a promising malaria vaccine started at NYU School of Medicine
... been an important focus of the Nussenzweigs' work ever since Dr. Ruth Nussenzweig first showed in 1967 that it was possible to prevent malaria infection by immunizing mice with irradiated parasites. At the time, scientists didn't think it was possible to prevent malaria by eliciting an immune-based respo...Discovery might improve design, effectiveness of anti-cancer drugs
...ned undisturbed, which was a surprise since no one ever saw that before. "This suggests how we might change an inhibitor molecule to make it fit the enzyme more perfectly and hence be more effective in blocking that enzyme's action in destroying anticancer drugs," said Dr. Richard V. Wolfenden, Alumni Dis...ORNL system eliminates perchlorate, helps scientists trace source
...ntities and examine the compound more closely than ever before. Using isotopic analysis, they compared naturally-occurring perchlorate from Chile's Atacama Desert to synthetic or manufactured samples and found the natural type had a much higher value of the oxygen-17 isotope (an oxygen atom with 8 p...Potential new oncogene may be missing link in cancer-causing chain
...evelopment when overactivated. "Because no one has ever connected LRP6 to proliferation in tumors, we believe we may have identified a new oncogene," says Guojun Bu, Ph.D., associate professor of pediatrics and of cell biology and physiology. The findings will be reported in the December 2nd issue of the ...Predicting infection risk of mosquito-borne disease
...reats to global health, infecting more people than ever before. Understanding how the risk of catching a mosquito-borne infection varies depending on the environment is an important step in planning and implementing effective control measures. The rate at which humans become infected is determined by how ...Yerkes researchers to present array of new data at Society for Neuroscience Meeting
...more comprehensive understanding of the brain than ever before." Following is a day-by-day overview of some of the data Yerkes researchers are presenting. Dates and times are listed for embargo purposes. Complete abstracts are available on the Society's Web site at http://sfn.scholarone.com/itin2004/ . ...One-way processes speed degradation of coral reefs
... rare and wild-caught fishes fosters investment in ever more sophisticated fishing equipment. And as expectations about coral reef productivity decrease, efforts to restore reefs are undermined. Birkeland proposes that organizations concerned about coral reefs should develop interventions that focus on pr...Gut microbes can open gates in fat cells
...importance of Fiaf by studying mice raised without ever being exposed to microorganisms. These so-called germ-free mice eat 30 percent more than normal mice yet have 50 percent less body fat," says Fredrik Bckhed, Ph.D., postdoctoral research scholar in the Center for Genome Sciences. In the germ-free mic...Look at past sea-level rise points to troubling future
...many more variables that go into this than I would ever have believed when I started studying the Gulf Coast in the 1980s."...Global warming's impact on US plants, animals determined from review of dozens of studies
...me plants are flowering earlier in the spring than ever before and some birds breeding earlier. In addition, species from Edith's checkerspot butterflies to the red fox have been gradually moving northward or to higher elevations, where more tolerable climate conditions now exist. Some of these species ar...Award will help unlock mysteries of one of Earth's most important organisms
... Armbrust was the lead author, describes the first ever genomic sequence of one species of diatom, a kind of phytoplankton, and offers surprising insights about the way it may be using nitrogen, fats and silica to thrive the world over. A news article in the magazine quotes a diatom systematist not connec...