The Human Genome Project was an ambitious initiative to sequence every piece of human DNA. The project drew together collaborators from research institutions around the world, including Whitehead Institute, and was finally ...
Biotechnology
Jun 9, 2022
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241
When animals experience a large injury, such as the loss of a limb, the body immediately begins a wound healing response that includes sealing the wound site and repairing local damage. In many animals, including humans, ...
Cell & Microbiology
May 19, 2022
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177
Whitehead Institute Member Sebastian Lourido and his lab members study the parasite Toxoplasma gondii. The parasite causes the disease toxoplasmosis, which can be dangerous for pregnant or immunocompromised patients.
Cell & Microbiology
Apr 29, 2022
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60
The Australian stinging tree (Dendrocnide moroides) is a plant that many people avoid at all costs. The tree, which is a member of the nettle family, is covered in thin silicon needles laced with one of nature's most excruciating ...
Biochemistry
Apr 21, 2022
0
106
Imagine a ball thrown in the air: it curves up, then down, tracing an arc to a point on the ground some distance away. The path of the ball can be described with a simple mathematical equation, and if you know the equation, ...
Cell & Microbiology
Feb 1, 2022
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22
Growing up is a complex process for multi-celled organisms—plants included. In the days or weeks it takes to go from a seed to a sprout to a full plant, plants express hundreds of genes in different places at different ...
Plants & Animals
Jan 12, 2022
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32
Humans need oxygen molecules for a process called cellular respiration, which takes place in our cells' mitochondria. Through a series of reactions called the electron transport chain, electrons are passed along in a sort ...
Cell & Microbiology
Dec 3, 2021
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233
In a paper published Nov. 4 in the journal Current Biology, Zak Swartz, a postdoctoral researcher at Whitehead Institute, along with researchers in the lab of Whitehead Institute Member Iain Cheeseman and collaborators at ...
Plants & Animals
Nov 5, 2021
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657
Many people—around half of the adult population—are infected with a type of herpesvirus called human cytomegalovirus, or HCMV. Though mostly asymptomatic, the virus can be dangerous for immunocompromised people and unborn ...
Cell & Microbiology
Oct 26, 2021
0
54
More than 10 percent of our genome is made up of repetitive, seemingly nonsensical stretches of genetic material called satellite DNA that do not code for any proteins. In the past, some scientists have referred to this DNA ...
Evolution
Aug 23, 2021
1
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