UCSB scientists discover how the brain encodes memories at a cellular level (Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Scientists at UC Santa Barbara have made a major discovery in how the brain encodes memories. The finding, published in the December 24 issue of the journal Neuron, could eventually lead to the development of new drugs to aid memory. The team of scientists is the first to uncover a central process in encoding memories that occurs at the level of the synapse, where neurons connect with each other. "When we learn new things, when we store memories, there are a number of things that have to happen," said senior author Kenneth S. Kosik, co-director and Harriman Chair in Neuroscience Research, at UCSB's Neuroscience Research Institute. Kosik is a leading researcher in the area of Alzheimer's disease. "One of the most important processes is that the synapses –– which cement those memories into place –– have to be strengthened," said Kosik. This is a neuron. (Photo Credit: Sourav Banerjee) Part of strengthening a synapse involves making new proteins.
Top 10 Signs Of Evolution In Modern Man Humans Through history, as natural selection played its part in the development of modern man, many of the useful functions and parts of the human body become unnecessary. What is most fascinating is that many of these parts of the body still remain in some form so we can see the progress of evolution. This list covers the ten most significant evolutionary changes that have taken place – leaving signs behind them. Goose Bumps Cutis Anserina Humans get goose bumps when they are cold, frightened, angry, or in awe. Jacobson’s Organ Vomeronasal organ Jacobson’s organ is a fascinating part of animal anatomy and it tells us a lot about our own sexual history. Junk DNA L-gulonolactone oxidase While many of the hangovers from our “devolved” past are visible or physical, this is not true for all. Extra Ear Muscles Auriculares muscles Early humans ate a lot of plants – and they needed to eat them quickly enough that they could eat a sufficient amount in one day to get all of the nutrients they needed.
News: New Microscope Produces Dazzling 3D Movies of Live Cells High-speed imaging with the Bessel beam plane illumination microscope reveals the ever-changing surface of a HeLa cell, with long, thin projections called filopodia continually extending and retracting. Video: Laboratory of Eric Betzig/Janelia Farm A new microscope invented by scientists at Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Farm Research Campus will let researchers use an exquisitely thin sheet of light—similar to that used in supermarket bar-code scanners—to peer inside single living cells, revealing the three-dimensional shapes of cellular landmarks in unprecedented detail. The microscopy technique images at high speed, so researchers can create dazzling movies that make biological processes, such as cell division, come alive. Liang Gao, Thomas Planchon and Eric Betzig display their new Bessel beam plane illumination microscope at HHMI’s Janelia Farm Research Campus. A major goal of biologists is to understand the rules that control molecular processes inside a cell.
Biologija.com.hr - Vijesti - Biologija - Evolucija vidljiva tijekom samo jedne generacije Idući puta kada se nađete u prirodi dobro se osvrnite oko sebe. Ne samo da uživate u aktivnostima izvan kuće već vjerojatno svjedočite i evoluciji koja vam se odvija pred očima. Novo istraživanje objavljeno u časopisu Science početkom ovog mjeseca, a koje se bavi utjecajem kukaca na populacije biljaka, pokazalo je da se evolucija može dogoditi puno brže nego što se prije pretpostavljalo, čak tijekom samo jedne generacije. Znanstvenici sa Sveučilišta u Torontu, zajedno a suradnicima, izveli su eksperiment koristeći dvogodišnju pupoljku (Oenothera biennis), tipičnu samooprašivajuću biljku koja producira genetički identične potomke. Da bi testirali jesu li insekti pokretači evolucije obrane biljaka, jedno polje je održavano bez insekata uz pomoć redovne primjene insekticida dva puta tjedno tijekom cijelog istraživanja dok je drugo bilo prepušteno normalnim količinama insekata. >>> Istraživanja na algama mijenjaju poznatu evoluciju biljaka Izvor: e!
Algae that live inside the cells of salamanders are the first known vertebrate endosymbionts Last modified: Monday, April 4, 2011 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 4, 2011 BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- A species of algae long known to associate with spotted salamanders has been discovered to live inside the cells of developing embryos, say scientists from the U.S. and Canada, who report their findings in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Photo courtesy of Roger Hangarter Salamander embryos grow inside egg capsules that are covered with and usually infiltrated by a type of green algae Print-Quality Photo This is the first known example of a eukaryotic algae living stably inside the cells of any vertebrate. "It raises the possibility that more animal/algae symbioses exist that we are not aware of," said Indiana University Bloomington biologist Roger Hangarter, the PNAS report's sole American coauthor. Biologists Ryan Kerney, Eunsoo Kim, Aaron Heiss, and Brian Hall of Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Cory Bishop of St. Vertebrates are backboned animals.
Homo erectus - H. erectus is a well known hominid IntroductionThroughout the early years of paleoanthropology, there were only two different species that were attributed to the genus Homo. These included the Neanderthals, and Homo erectus. In the early 1960s, this began to change, and human ancestry seemed to be populated by many different players. Some (e.g., M. The species was named by Eugène Dubois (it was originally designated as Pithecanthropus erectus) in 1894, after his 1891 find from Trinil, Java, in Indonesia (Trinil 2). The material was later associated with the Chinese material from Zhoukoudian, and renamed Homo erectus. Diagnostic Features The dates for erectus have become earlier and earlier, while habilis remains have been found in later and later deposits, making a lineage involving habilis ancestral to erectus increasingly unlikely. This view has some validity in that these species are usually considered “chronospecies” due to anagenesis. One of the most important erectus specimen is the Nariokotome Boy, KNM-WT 15000.
Gigantic New SuperOrganism with 'Social Intelligence' is Devouring the Titanic In 2000, Roy Cullimore, a microbial ecologist and Charles Pellegrino, scientist and author of Ghosts of the Titanic discovered that the Titanic --which sank in the Atlantic Ocean 97 years ago -- was being devoured by a monster microbial industrial complex of extremophiles as alien we might expect to find on Jupiter's ocean-bound Europa. What they discovered is the largest, strangest cooperative microorganism on Earth. Scientists believe that this strange super-organism is using a common microbial language that could be either chemical or electrical -a phenomenon called "quorum sensing" by which whole communities "sense" each other's presence and activities aiding and abetting the organization, cooperation, and growth. The microbes are consuming the wreck's metal, creating mats of rust bigger than a dozen four-story brownstones that are creeping slowly along the hull harvesting iron from the rivets and burrowing into layers of steel plating. A view of the bathtub in Capt.
Replication How did life originate? How did life originate? Living things (even ancient organisms like bacteria) are enormously complex. However, all this complexity did not leap fully-formed from the primordial soup. Instead life almost certainly originated in a series of small steps, each building upon the complexity that evolved previously: Simple organic molecules were formed. Multicellularity evolved.
Structure "The Thing": A 140,000-Year-Old Organism Discovered in Antarctica's Ice-Shrouded Lake Vostok An ancient living laboratory of our planet's past in Antarctica may have provided a preview of what we can expect to find deep below the barren surface of Mars and in the ice-shrouded seas of Jupiter's Europa. Two of the world's leading experts on life at the lower temperature extremes, Buford Price of the University of California, Berkeley and Todd Sowers of Penn State observed that microbes colonizing life appear to have two levels of metabolism: a survival metabolism in which they remain alive but become dormant until exposed to nutrients or higher temperatures, or, a maintenance metabolism for steady sustained growth. The team observed that some organisms in permafrost appear to have "protein repair enzymes that maintain active recycling of certain amino acids needed for cell repair for at least 30,000 years." They added that the "extremely low expenditures of survival energy enable microbial communities in extreme environments to survive indefinitely."
Genome The Improvisational Brain Credit: Flickr user maistora One summer at the annual Bremen Music Festival in Germany, Robert Levin, a classical pianist, was in the midst of improvising a passionate and wild cadenza during Beethoven’s “C Major Piano Concerto.” A cadenza is a passage in a concerto during which the orchestra ceases and a soloist strikes out on his own, improvising within the style of the piece. Up until the early nineteenth century, many classical composers wrote space for these cadenzas within their works. “I was going whole hog,” Levin said, thanks to the permission Beethoven gave his renderers to modulate or change keys during his cadenzas. “It’s like the world,” Levin said, drawing a parallel to the structure of musical scales. At this point, Levin pounded some F sharp major chords, and for a split second, he paused. Imagine the pressure: Levin is sitting at the piano. “I looked down at the keyboard and imagined myself saying: ‘Save me! What happened next, Levin said, was truly miraculous.