Alternate bearing (also called biennial or uneven bearing) is the tendency of fruit trees to produce a heavy crop one year (called "on-crop") followed by a light crop or no crop the following "off-crop" year. On-crop trees produce a large number of small fruit of little commercial value, while off-crop trees produce a small number of large fruit—a high proportion of which are culled in packinghouses due to their unattractive, thick rinds. The phenomenon is widespread and can occur in an entire region, in individual trees, part of a tree, or even on one branch.
For thousands of years an undesirable and persistent companion has been travelling with man wherever he goes. Mycobacterium leprae, the bacterium that causes leprosy, has only one known natural host – mankind. And because of man's many travels, this bacillus has colonized the entire earth. Its history is therefore intimately tied to our own, and it is this migratory relationship that Stewart Cole, EPFL professor of Microbial Pathogenesis, and his team have analyzed in a study to be published in Nature Genetics. Geneticists, microbiologists, and even archeologists have followed the bacteria's traces from their lab to the Silk Road and the tombs of Egyptian mummies.
Pateamine A (PatA), a natural product first isolated from marine sponges, has attracted considerable attention as a potential anti-cancer agent, and now a new activity has been found for it, which may reveal yet another anti-cancer mechanism. That's the assessment of Daniel Romo, a Texas A&M chemistry professor, and his colleagues at Johns Hopkins University who are pioneers in research involving this novel marine natural product.
One might say plants don't have a leg to stand on, but that may actually give them a leg up on the animal kingdom when it comes to environmental adaptability.
A global collaborative has produced a first draft of the genome of a domesticated pig, an achievement that will lead to insights in agriculture, medicine, conservation and evolution.
Scientists at the University of Bonn have discovered a previously unknown fruit fly gene that controls the metabolism of fat. Larvae in which this gene is defective lose their entire fat reserves. Therefore the researchers called the gene 'schlank' (German for 'slim'). Mammals carry a group of genes that are structurally very similar to 'schlank'. They possibly take on a similar function in the energy metabolism. The scientists therefore have hopes in new medicines with which obesity could be fought. Their research bas been published in 'The EMBO Journal' (doi: 10.1038/emboj.2009.305).
Why do so many animal species — including fish, birds and insects — display such rich diversity in coloration and other traits? In new research, Gregory Grether, UCLA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, and Christopher Anderson, who recently earned his doctorate in Grether's laboratory, offer an answer.
Like savvy Wall Street money managers, bacteria hedge their bets to increase their chances of survival in uncertain times, strategically investing their biological resources to weather unpredictable environments. In a new study available online and featured on the cover of today's issue of Cell, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers describe how bacteria play the market so well. Inside each bacterial cell are so-called genetic circuits that provide specific survival skills. Within the bacteria population, these genetic circuits generate so much diversity that the population as a whole is more tolerant of – and is more likely to survive – a wide range of variability in the environment.
New insights into the biology of the platypus and echidna have been published, providing a collection of unique research data about the world's only monotremes.
Moose eat plants; wolves kill moose. What difference does this classic predator-prey interaction make to biodiversity?
Saturated fats have a deservedly bad reputation, but Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that a sticky lipid occurring naturally at high levels in the brain may help us memorize grandma's recipe for cinnamon buns, as well as recall how, decades ago, she served them up steaming from the oven.
Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have shown that a highly specific intrabody (an antibody fragment that works against a target inside a cell) is capable of stalling the development of Huntington's disease in a variety of mouse models.
Unnoticed by the nearby residents of St. Johnsbury, Vermont, tiny leaf beetles that flit among the maple and willow trees in the area have just provided some of the clearest evidence yet that environmental factors play a major role in the formation of new species.
A research team from the University of Castilla-La Mancha (UCLM) has analysed the presence of heavy metals in 12 species of mushroom collected from non-contaminated natural areas, and has found that the levels vary depending on the type of mushroom. The results of the study, which appears this month in the journal Biometals, show that the largest quantities of lead and neodymium are found in chanterelles.
Ever since the previously unknown SARS virus emerged from southern China in 2003, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston virologists have focused on finding the source of the pathogen's virulence — its ability to cause disease. In the 2003 epidemic, for example, between 5 and 10 percent of those who fell sick from the SARS virus died, adding up to more than 900 fatalities worldwide.
Like yoga for office drones, cells do have coping strategies for stress. Heat, lack of nutrients, oxygen radicals – all can wreak havoc on the delicate internal components of a cell, potentially damaging it beyond repair. Proteins called HSPs (heat shock proteins) allow cells to survive stress-induced damage. Scientists have long studied how HSPs work in order to harness their therapeutic potential.
New research on the fruit-fly brain points to a possible mechanism by which temperature influences the body clock, according to scientists from Queen Mary, University of London.
A new report appearing in The Journal of Leukocyte Biology (http://www.jleukbio.org) argues that human missions to Mars, as well as all other long-term space flights might be compromised by microbial hitchhikers, such as bacteria. That's because long-term space travel packs a one-two punch to astronauts: first it appears to weaken their immune systems; and second, it increases the virulence and growth of microbes. This combination of factors makes it vital for scientists to find tools that can help people cope with these microscopic hitchhikers before they lead to disease, especially since astronauts will not have the ability to return home to a hospital.
Researchers have shown how an antiviral protein produced by the immune system, dubbed tetherin, tames HIV and other viruses by literally putting them on a leash, to prevent their escape from infected cells. The insights reported in the October 30th issue of the journal Cell, a Cell Press publication, allowed the research team to design a completely artificial protein -- one that did not resemble native tetherin in its sequence at all -- that could nonetheless put a similar stop to the virus.
Biologists have shown that independent but similar molecular changes turned a harmless digestive enzyme into a toxin in two unrelated species -- a shrew and a lizard -- giving each a venomous bite.
Our lab is interested in computational approaches to understanding biological function and the genetic basis of diseases. Our work falls into three interrelated aims.
