Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin and Yuri Milner created the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences Foundation.
Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin and Yuri Milner, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, have jointly established the most lucrative annual prize in the history of science to reward research into curing diseases and extending human life.
Continue reading… “Silicon Valley entrepreneurs announce Breakthrough Prize”
This is a plant nothing touches!
Contrary to long-held beliefs, plants and animals have developed remarkably similar mechanisms for detecting microbial invasions. This holds promise for the future treatment of infectious diseases in humans.
Continue reading… “Plants and Animals Fending Off Diseases!”
A real life Jack and the Bean Stock! Genecially modified plants
Genetically modified plants can come about by natural means. A research group at Lund University in Sweden has described the details of such an event among higher plants. It is likely that the gene transfer was mediated by a parasite or a pathogen.
Continue reading… “Spontaneous GMOs in Nature”
“Malaria No More” plans on destroying all malaria by 2015!
At a global scale, the sickle cell gene is most commonly found in areas with historically high levels of malaria, adding geographical support to the hypothesis that the gene, while potentially deadly, avoids disappearing through natural selection by providing protection against malaria.
Continue reading… ““The Sickle Cell Gene” Supports ‘Malaria Hypothesis””
A reliable method for producing plants that carry genetic material from only one of their parents has been discovered by plant biologists at UC Davis. The technique, to be published March 25 in the journal Nature, could dramatically speed up the breeding of crop plants for desirable traits.
Continue reading… “Plant Breeding Breakthrough: Offspring With Genes from Only One Parent”
Scientists have pinpointed how a key hormone helps animals to recognise others by their smell.
Continue reading… “Hormone Study Gives Scientists a Sense of How Animals Bond”
New research from scientists in Liverpool has revealed the relationship between agility and vision in mammals. The study, published in the Journal of Anatomy, sampled 51 species to compare the relationship between agility and vision between frontal eyed species, such as cats, to lateral-eyed mammals, such as rabbits, to establish if the positioning of the eyes resulted in limitations to speed and agility.
Continue reading… “Is an Animal’s Agility Affected by the Position of Its Eyes?”
Groundbreaking research led by Dr Emmeline Hill, a leading horse genomics researcher at University College Dublin’s (UCD) School of Agriculture, Food Science and Veterinary Medicine has resulted in the identification of the ‘speed gene’ in thoroughbred horses.
Continue reading… “Genetic Test for ‘Speed Gene’ in Thoroughbred Horses”
Researchers at The University of Western Ontario (Western) led an international and multi-disciplinary study that sheds new light on the way that bats echolocate. With echolocation, animals emit sounds and then listen to the reflected echoes of those sounds to form images of their surroundings in their brains.
Soybean, one of the most important global sources of protein and oil, is now the first legume species with a published complete draft genome sequence. The sequence and its analysis appear in the January 14 edition of the journal Nature.
In an advance with overtones of Star Trek phasers and other sci-fi ray guns, scientists in Canada are reporting development of an internal on-off “switch” that paralyzes animals when exposed to a beam of ultraviolet light. The animals stay paralyzed even when the light is turned off. When exposed to ordinary light, the animals become unparalyzed and wake up.
Were dinosaurs “warm-blooded” like present-day mammals and birds, or “cold-blooded” like present day lizards? The implications of this simple-sounding question go beyond deciding whether or not you’d snuggle up to a dinosaur on a cold winter’s evening.
Continue reading… “Warm-blooded Dinosaurs Worked Up A Sweat”
