We tend to think of the human body as operating out of a sense-and-respond paradigm. For example, you eat sugar, the pancreas senses the intake, and it responds by releasing the hormone insulin to keep the body's glucose ...
Biochemistry
Mar 1, 2022
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104
In a discovery with implications for colorectal cancer in humans, RIKEN geneticists have found that a gene that determines eye color in fruit flies also plays a role in the tendency of gut stem cells to proliferate out of ...
Cell & Microbiology
Jun 24, 2021
0
10
Ketone bodies are generally an alternative energy source during starvation, but in newborns, ketogenesis is active regardless of nutritional status. In a recent study from Kumamoto University (Japan), researchers analyzed ...
Cell & Microbiology
Mar 16, 2021
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63
RIKEN developmental biologists have analyzed the transitions that precede metamorphosis in fruit fly larvae using experiments and mathematical modeling1. They have also identified the survival strategies underlying these ...
Plants & Animals
Jan 15, 2021
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18
By studying the body chemistry of hibernating Arctic ground squirrels, researchers have found that the animals are able to recycle their body's own nutrients to survive during a long, inactive winter.
Plants & Animals
Dec 7, 2020
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243
NAD, or nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, probably needs no introduction. Together with its primary alter-egos NADH, NADP and NADPH, our private suite of pyridine-based nucleotides serve as hydride donors in some 400 enzymatic ...
Although all humans share similar changes during aging such as gray hair, wrinkles, and a general decline in function, aging is considered to be the result of a cellular wear-and-tear process due to accumulated random damage, ...
Evolution
Nov 2, 2020
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233
Our job seems easy when compared with that of our cells. While they are hard at work, breaking some molecules and building others, we mainly have to do one thing—feed them. But what exactly should we feed them? This is ...
Cell & Microbiology
Aug 31, 2020
1
63
In order to grow and thrive, cells need sugar. A repertoire of cellular mechanisms turn unwieldy molecules of glucose and fructose into versatile building blocks for making useful molecules such as lipids, and energy to fuel ...
Molecular & Computational biology
Jul 30, 2020
0
16
As people get older, they often feel less energetic, mobile or active. This may be due in part to a decline in mitochondria, the tiny powerhouses inside of our cells, which provide energy and regulate metabolism. In fact, ...
Cell & Microbiology
May 19, 2020
0
365
