Virginia Tech, Nanjing Institute researchers discover half-billion year-old fossils
...y distantly related to living animals. "But direct observation of the hypothesized tube-like elements has been difficult because such tubes tend to be deflated and squashed prior to their preservation in sandstones," Xiao said. This may change with the new discovery of Ediacara fossils from fine-grained limeston...Brain size may depend upon how neural cells are cleaved
... progenitor cells, which could still divide. "This observation led us to want to further test whether impairment of Gβγ has any consequences for cell fate in division, because it has been speculated that the different division planes dictate the ultimate cell fate adoption of daughter cells," said Tsai....Don Quixote's home shows way to future Earth Observation missions
...ded project called DEMETER (DEMonstration of Earth observation Techologies in Routine advisory irrigation services) that is investigating the utility of satellite data as an aid to irrigation management of water-stressed regions. Professor Jose Moreno of the University of Valencia, coordinator of the SEN2FLEX ca...Defective sweet taste receptor gene shapes cat cuisine
... receptor." "Our results account for the common observation that the cat lives in a different sensory world than the cat owner," comments Vronique Legrand-Defretin, Ph.D, Director for the Global Feeding Behavior Research program at the Waltham Centre. "Waltham finds it critical to understand these unique cha...Unraveling a stomach cancer puzzle
... July 24) -- It started several years ago with the observation that a large group of seemingly unconnected genes were behaving differently in patients with stomach cancer. Now a multi-national research team led by the Melbourne Branch of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research (LICR) has joined the proverbial d...UT Southwestern researchers find differences in a predictor of heart disease among sexes, races
...s in CRP levels. The most striking finding was the observation that almost two-thirds of black women had CRP levels above the Centers for Disease Control-defined high-risk threshold. These differences may have implications for the broad use of CRP testing." Long-term studies are needed to see if increased CRP l...Penn State to host US DOE regional climate center
...em might respond to future climate change." Close observation and manipulation of this kind aims to show, for example, how the physiology of plants responds to increases in carbon dioxide and how carbon dioxide levels react to changes in the ecosystem. The continuous give and take of climate change and enviro...NIH selects Burnham Institute for Exploratory Center for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research
...lop imaging technology that will allow "real time" observation of stem cells, studies on the molecular signals that enable self-renewal and specialization of stem cells, and ongoing studies to improve on methods for growing and maintaining cells. "Our primary goal in establishing a stem cell center at The Burnha...Locusts' built-in 'surface analysis' ability directs them to fly overland
...ell as straight north over southern Israel. This observation led to examination by scientists of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Department of Evolution, Systematics and Ecology and the Interuniversity Institute for Marine Sciences in Eilat to examine how the locusts were able to identify the gulf water and...New insights into the early development of diabetes and the link to obesity
...ot involved with the study, states that "the basal observation is clinically very relevant in that it might explain the weight maintenance problems that insulin-resistant and obese individuals experience". Because exposure to insulin (as normally happens after a meal) leads to increased energy production in the ......ee orange circles. A small plexiglass tube with an observation port was positioned 25 cm (about 10 inches) away. Other bumblebees, one at a time, were allowed to press their faces against the port and watch from three to 12 trained bees feed for 10 minutes. At that distance, an observer bee could tell that there...Deep-sea exploration beneath Katrina's wake
...e of the key goals for Eye-in-the-Sea beyond basic observation is to use the bioluminescence lure and other techniques to learn how animals use the light they produce. Based in large part on the success of last year's expedition, Widder has been awarded a $500,000 National Science Foundation grant to build a mo...UCSF study points to link to neurodegenerative disease target
...erve and muscle disassembles and degenerates. This observation enabled the team to look for new genes involved in the BMP signaling system, which led to the identification of specific stabilizing factors in the nervous system. "It is a very complicated task to keep the nervous system stable. We are using a mod...Mouse genome much more complex than expected
...s. Only twice as many genes as a threadworm? This observation might also explain the big question why mammals only have about twice as many genes as threadworms, which have a much simpler structure. 'Our study calls into question the classic view that one gene contains the information for exactly one protein,' ...UCSD study of nuclear receptors could change anti-inflammatory treatments
... therapeutic results with fewer side effects. The observation that these proteins can function together opens up new avenues of clinical investigation into the treatment of diseases."...Learning how SARS spikes its quarry
...llow subsequent human-to-human transmission. "The observation is that a dramatic epidemiological difference can result from what looks like an almost trivial mutation," said Harrison. "These findings give us the beginnings of information needed -- if a new virus were isolated -- to make predictive guesses about...A novel method to measure circadian cycles
...riations in humans, the required period of lengthy observation is prohibitively costly and labor intensive. Circumventing these technical limitations, Ueli Schibler and colleagues report in the open-access journal PLoS Biology a new method to measure circadian cycles in mammalian cells cultured from tissues ...Sept/Oct 2005 Annals of Family Medicine tip sheet
...rn family medicine practices used medical records, observation of outpatient encounters, and patient exit cards to calculate practice level rates of delivery of preventive services. Often acute and chronic illness care competes with delivery of preventive services, therefore crowding out prevention services. I...Health of coral reefs detected from orbit
...y are unable to regenerate." Aerial or boat-based observation is the current method of detecting bleaching, but many reefs are either inaccessible or simply too large (the Great Barrier Reef has an area of 350 000 square kilometres) for an event that happens within a fortnight. Bleached corals may rapidly be co......ts and land surfaces. MERIS was optimised for the observation of ocean colour used to derive marine phytoplankton and water contents - while AATSR's main task is to maintain a long-term record of sea surface temperature (SST) commenced by predecessor sensors (ATSR-1 and -2) from 1991 onwards. The Workshop hea...