Programmable DNA scissors found for bacterial immune system

(Phys.org) -- Genetic engineers and genomics researchers should welcome the news from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) where an international team of scientists has discovered a new and possibly more ...

Researchers discover a new role for RNAi

Organisms employ a fascinating array of strategies to identify and restrain invasive pieces of foreign DNA, such as those introduced by viruses. For example, many viruses produce double-stranded (ds)RNA during their life ...

A SMART(er) way to track influenza

In April 2009, the world took notice as reports surfaced of a virus in Mexico that had mutated from pigs and was being passed from human to human. The H1N1 "swine flu," as the virus was named, circulated worldwide, killing ...

Revealing a pollutant's Achilles' heal

Nitric oxide (NO) is a versatile free radical that plays central roles in the environment as well as living organisms. At low concentration in the human body, for example, NO protects organs against pathogens by acting as ...

Enzyme corrects more than one million faults in DNA replication

Scientists from the Medical Research Council (MRC) Institute of Genetics and Molecular Medicine (IGMM) at the University of Edinburgh have discovered an enzyme that corrects the most common mistake in mammalian DNA.

Earth history and evolution

In classical mythology, the cypress tree is associated with death, the underworld and eternity. Indeed, the family to which cypresses belong, is an ancient lineage of conifers, and a new study of their evolution affords a ...

Orangutans harbor ancient primate Alu

Alu elements infiltrated the ancestral primate genome about 65 million years ago. Once gained an Alu element is rarely lost so comparison of Alu between species can be used to map primate evolution and diversity. New research ...

A new approach to molecular plant breeding

(Phys.org) -- A U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientist has shown researchers and plant breeders a better way to handle the massive amounts of data being generated by plant molecular studies, using an approach that ...

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