science newsletter: Science News SciGuru.com

Τρίτη 10 Δεκεμβρίου 2013

Science News SciGuru.com

Tracking Zinc's Location for Early Diagnosis of Prostate Cancer
Model explains how brain learns new things while retaining learned materials
Gene sequencing project finds family of drugs with promise for treating childhood tumor
A Personal Antidepressant for Every Genome
Harvesting Electricity: Triboelectric Generators Capture Wasted Power

Tracking Zinc's Location for Early Diagnosis of Prostate Cancer

Posted: 09 Dec 2013 06:30 PM PST

Zinc, an essential nutrient, is found in every tissue in the body. The vast majority of the metal ion is tightly bound to proteins, helping them to perform biological reactions. Tiny amounts of zinc, however, are only loosely bound, or “mobile,” and thought to be critical for proper function in organs such as the brain, pancreas, and prostate gland. Yet the exact roles the ion plays in biological systems are unknown.

Model explains how brain learns new things while retaining learned materials

Posted: 09 Dec 2013 06:13 PM PST

To learn new motor skills, the brain must be plastic: able to rapidly change the strengths of connections between neurons, forming new patterns that accomplish a particular task. However, if the brain were too plastic, previously learned skills would be lost too easily.

A new computational model developed by MIT neuroscientists explains how the brain maintains the balance between plasticity and stability, and how it can learn very similar tasks without interference between them.

Gene sequencing project finds family of drugs with promise for treating childhood tumor

Posted: 09 Dec 2013 02:43 PM PST

Drugs that enhance a process called oxidative stress were found to kill rhabdomyosarcoma tumor cells growing in the laboratory and possibly bolstered the effectiveness of chemotherapy against this aggressive tumor of muscle and other soft tissue. The findings are the latest from the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital–Washington University Pediatric Cancer Genome Project and appear in the December 9 edition of the scientific journal Cancer Cell.

A Personal Antidepressant for Every Genome

Posted: 09 Dec 2013 11:22 AM PST

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the most commonly prescribed antidepressants, but they don't work for everyone. What's more, patients must often try several different SSRI medications, each with a different set of side effects, before finding one that is effective. It takes three to four weeks to see if a particular antidepressant drug works. Meanwhile, patients and their families continue to suffer.

Harvesting Electricity: Triboelectric Generators Capture Wasted Power

Posted: 09 Dec 2013 08:59 AM PST

With one stomp of his foot, Zhong Lin Wang illuminates a thousand LED bulbs – with no batteries or power cord. The current comes from essentially the same source as that tiny spark that jumps from a fingertip to a doorknob when you walk across carpet on a cold, dry day. Wang and his research team have learned to harvest this power and put it to work.