One of the most critical biological and medical tools available today, it lies at the core of genome analysis. Reading the exact make-up of genes,
scientists can detect mutations, or even identify different organisms. A powerful DNA sequencing method uses tiny
"and are strung together in various combinations that contain the cell's genetic information, such as genes. Essentially
Slowing things down The lab of Aleksandra Radenovic at EPFL's Institute of Bioengineering has now overcome the problem of speed by using a thick,
They are also found in the biological world, where examples include mother-of-pearl and the iridescent wing-scales of certain butterflies,
"says Nicholas Abbott, a UW-Madison professor of chemical and biological engineering.""It's quite a versatile approach."
#Self-Assembled DNA NANOSTRUCTURES Could Be used as Smart Drug-Delivery Vehicles Researchers from Aalto University have published an article in the recent Trends in Biotechnology journal.
and how these features enable the development of efficient biological DNA-nanomachines. Moreover, these DNA NANOSTRUCTURES provide new applications in molecular medicine,
and the group has published just recently two research articles regarding DNA-based applications in biotechnology and molecular medicine.
The current gold standard for Ebola virus detection relies on a method called polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to amplify the virus's genetic material for detection.
nontarget biomolecules are washed off, and the bound targets are released then by heating, labeled with fluorescent markers,
what has been an essential mystery in biology and is published on 25 september in the prestigious journal, Science.
Professor Lithgow and his team used a novel technology that enables the systematic expansion of the genetic codes of living organisms to include unnatural amino acids beyond the common twenty.
and other standard techniques in structural biology to unlock its transport secrets. The Lithgow lab, working with colleagues from Nagoya, Kyoto and Tokyo, ramped up scale of the technology making literally hundreds of re-coded TOM 40 complexes, each one with a novel additional 21st amino acid.
Having shown the technology works-Professor Lithgow believes other labs working on diverse processes in human cell biology will mimic these experiments to determine how their chosen nanomachines operate.
what has been a major unknown in biology, and other cellular mysteries are now ripe for the picking"he said.
Thus proteins that bind specifically to complementary chemical structures are also indispensable for many biochemical and biotechnological applications.
Many of the methods routinely used in the biosciences are based on the specific modification of proteins, in particular antibodies,
"explained Stephen T. C. Wong, Ph d.,P. E.,Chair of the Department of Systems Medicine and Bioengineering at Houston Methodist Research Institute."
. a professor of circuits and systems and biomedical engineering expert who is the Director of Virtus, the Centre of Excellence in IC Design, at NTU's School of Electrical and Electronic engineering."
Elevations in the two examined gene markers of liver toxicity were detected then accurately and consistent with previously known changes, indicating that lab in a needle is an appropriate diagnostic option."
Alexander Rohrbach conducts research at the Department of Microsystems Engineering (IMTEK) and is an associate member of the Cluster of Excellence BIOSS Centre for Biological Signalling Studies of the University of Freiburg g
Dassarma, Phd, a professor of microbiology and immunology at the school,"GVNPS offer a designer platform for vaccines
One of Tkaczyk co-authors on the research was Rebecca Richards-Kortum, Rice Malcolm Gillis University Professor, director of the Institute of Biosciences and Bioengineering and of Rice 360°:
Rice chemist Jeffrey Hartgerink, lead author Vivek Kumar and their colleagues reported their discovery in the American Chemical Society journal ACS Biomaterials Science and Engineering.
#Prosthetic Hands with Macro-Sieve Peripheral Nerve Interface Can Feel Hot and Cold and Sense of touch Daniel Moran, Phd, professor of biomedical engineering in the School of engineering & Applied science and of neurobiology,
. who is a pioneer in the converging fields of synthetic biology, metabolic engineering, and genetics. Church is the Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical school and Professor of Health Sciences and Technology at Harvard and MIT.
Critical to this process of metabolically engineering microbes is the use of biosensors. Made of a biological component-such as a fluorescent protein
-and a'detector'that responds to the presence of a specific chemical, biosensors act as the switches
But so far, scientists have had only access to a limited variety of biosensors that have little relevance to the biomanufacturing of valuable chemicals.
which we would rely on biomanufacturing for the clean production of chemical and pharmaceutical commodities, "said Wyss Institute Founding Director Donald E. Ingber, M d.,Ph d,
. who is also the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical school and Boston Children's Hospital,
and Professor of Bioengineering at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of engineering and Applied sciences s
#Innovative Light-Sensing System Reconstructs Human Postures Continuously and Unobtrusively A Dartmouth College team has created the first light-sensing system that reconstructs human postures continuously
They presented their findings Aug 26 at the 37th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society in Milan, Italy.
An advantage of this system is that magnetic fields are able to pass freely through biological tissues,
says a Texas A&m University biomedical engineering researcher who is developing the technology. The wearable technology combines motion sensors and the measurement of electrical activity generated by muscles to interpret hand gestures,
says Roozbeh Jafari, associate professor in the university Department of Biomedical engineering and researcher at the Center for Remote Health Technologies and Systems.
Jafari is associate professor in Texas A&m Department of Biomedical engineering, associate professor in the Department of computer science and Engineering and the Department of Electrical and Computer engineering,
#MIT Develops Protein-Based Sensor Capable of Killing Cancer cells MIT biological engineers have developed a modular system of proteins that can detect a particular DNA sequence in a cell
says James Collins, the Termeer Professor of Medical Engineering and Science in MIT Department of Biological engineering and Institute of Medical Engineering and Science (IMES).
a professor of biotechnology and bioengineering at The swiss Federal Institute of technology in Zurich, described this experiment as an legant proof of conceptthat could lead to greatly improved treatments for viral infection. entinel designer cells engineered with the DNA sense
whether genetic material has been delivered successfully to cells that scientists are trying to genetically alter. Cells that did not receive the new gene could be induced to undergo cell death,
or to study the 3-D structure of normal chromosomes by testing whether two genes located far from each other on a chromosome fold in such a way that they end up next to each other,
the researchers say
#Liquid crystals Detect Protein Fibers Associated with Development of Neurodegenerative Diseases Liquid crystals are familiar to most of us as the somewhat humdrum stuff used to make computer displays and TVS.
Floating on top of the film was made a membrane of molecules resembling those found in the membranes of biological cells.
the researchers argue that their new method for controlling brain cells could improve on"optogenetics","a technique that uses light rather than sound.
Consequently, using optogenetics to control brain circuits in a mammal currently requires a fibre-optic implant.
"said the study's first author Stuart Ibsen, from the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in California.
#New age of genome editing could lead to cure for sickle cell anemia Australia researchers have shown that changing just a single letter of the DNA of human red blood cells in the laboratory increases their production of oxygen-carrying haemoglobin-a world-first
The new genome editing technique, in which a beneficial, naturally-occurring genetic mutation is introduced into cells,
"An exciting new age of genome editing is beginning, now that single genes within our vast genome can be precisely cut and repaired,
"says study leader, Dean of Science at UNSW, Professor Merlin Crossley.""Our laboratory study provides a proof of concept that changing just one letter of DNA in a gene could alleviate the symptoms of sickle cell anaemia and thalassaemia-inherited diseases in
"Because the good genetic variation we introduced already exists in nature, this approach should be effective and safe.
"Mutations affecting adult haemoglobin are among the most common of all human genetic mutations, with about five per cent of the world's population carrying a defective adult haemoglobin gene.
The researchers based their new approach on the fact that a small number of people with damaged adult haemoglobin have an additional, beneficial mutation in the foetal haemoglobin gene."
"This good mutation keeps their foetal haemoglobin gene switched on for the whole of their lives,
The researchers introduced this single-letter mutation into human red blood cells using genome-editing proteins known as TALENS,
When our genome editing protein cuts the DNA, the cell quickly replaces it with the donor DNA that we have provided also."
If the genome-editing technique is shown to work effectively in blood stem cells and be safe,
such as conventional gene therapy, in which viruses are used to ferry healthy genes into a cell to replace the defective ones.
"Through a combination of high-resolution cryo-electron microscopy (CRYO EM) and a unique methodology for image analysis, a team of researchers with Berkeley Lab and the University of California (UC) Berkeley has produced an atomic view of microtubules
and reform into spindles that are used by the dividing cell to move chromosomes. For chromosome migration to occur,
the microtubules attached to them must disassemble, carrying the chromosomes in the process. The dynamic instability that makes it possible for microtubules to transition from a rigid polymerized
or"assembled"nucleotide state to a flexible depolymerized or"disassembled"nucleotide state is driven by guanosine triphosphate (GTP) hydrolysis in the microtubule lattice."
a biophysicist with Berkeley Lab's Life sciences Division who led this research. Nogales, who is also a professor of biophysics
and structural biology at UC Berkeley and investigator with the Howard hughes medical institute, is a leading authority on the structure and dynamics of microtubules.
In this latest study, she and her group used CRYO EM in which protein samples are flash-frozen at liquid nitrogen temperatures to preserve their natural structure,
to determine microtubule structures in different nucleotide states with and without EB3. With CRYO EM and their image analysis methodology, they achieved a resolution of 3. 5 Angstroms, a record for microtubules.
For perspective, the diameter of a hydrogen atom is about 1. 0 Angstroms.""We can now study the atomic details of microtubule polymerization
Beyond their importance to our understanding of basic cell biology, microtubules are a major target for anticancer drugs, such as Taxol,
years in advance has been developed in research published in the open access journal Genome Biology. The study aimed to define a set of genes associated with'healthy ageing'in 65 year olds.
but there has been no reliable test for underlying'biological age'."'"Our discovery provides the first robust molecular'signature'of biological age in humans
and should be able to transform the way that'age'is used to make medical decisions.
New CRISPR-Cas9 strategy edits genes 2 ways The CRISPR-Cas9 system has been in the limelight mainly as a revolutionary genome engineering tool used to modify specific gene sequences within the vast sea of an organism
genome engineering and gene regulation, are initiated with a common step: the Cas9 protein is recruited to targeted genes by the so-called matching sequences of"GUIDE RNA"that help Cas9 latch on to specific sequences of DNA in a given genome.
But until now, genome engineering and gene regulation required different variants of the Cas9 protein; while the former task hinges on Cas9's innate DNA-cleaving activity,
the latter has been achieved by engineered Cas9 variants that have had their DNA-cleaving"fangs"removed, but still retain their ability to latch onto a specific genomic target.
These latter Cas9 variants are fused commonly with proteins that regulate gene expression. Now, using a new approach developed by researchers led by George Church, Ph d.,of Harvard and Ron Weiss, Ph d.,of the Massachusetts institute of technology,
Church is Core Faculty member at Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical school and Professor of Health Sciences and Technology at Harvard and MIT,
and Weiss is Professor of Biological engineering and also Professor of Electrical engineering and Computer science at MIT.
Ph d.,Wyss Institute Core Faculty member and the Termeer Professor of Medical Engineering & Science and Professor of Biological engineering at MIT, is also a co-investigator
we can now for the first time toggle a single protein to gain direct control over both, gene sequences and gene expression,
. who is also the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical school and Boston Children's Hospital and Professor of Bioengineering at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of engineering and Applied sciences s
or mechanical stress on the chromosomes into which our genetic material is packaged. To make sure cells stay alive
--and in a study published online in Nature Chemical Biology on September 7, researchers at The Rockefeller University uncover new aspects of it."
a postdoctoral fellow in the Laboratory of Chemistry and Cell biology, led by Tarun Kapoor.""We now know how key proteins get where they need to be to facilitate the process.""
""This is also a nice example of how innovative chemical approaches can help decipher fundamental biological mechanisms,
For instance, different regions of a chromosome can fuse together, causing genes to rearrange themselves --and such chromosome fusions can lead to diseases such as cancer.
To learn more about the process, Kapoor, Kleiner and their colleagues zeroed in on the sites in chromosomes where DNA repair happens.
Specifically they focused on a single histone, a type of protein that DNA wraps around to make up chromosomes.
This histone, H2ax, is known to be involved in DNA repair. Immediately after DNA damage occurs, H2ax gets a mark--it becomes tagged with a chemical moiety known as a phosphate.
'Genome editing in human T-cells has been a notable challenge for the field, 'said lead author Dr Alexander Marson from the University of California, San francisco.'
'We have now been able to cut as well as paste pieces of the genome into human T-cells for the first time to our knowledge,
the only difference being a small number of mutations responsible for causing the cells to become cancerous.
To overcome this, the scientists used a technique called'mutation tracking'a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test
which is personalised to the mutations of an individual patient's cancer DNA. The test screened the blood for DNA with these mutations.
Any DNA in the blood with these mutations must have been released by cancer cells remaining after the initial round of treatment.
As well as being used to predict relapse, the test will allow scientists to track further mutations that develop in cancers over time,
the researchers say. This knowledge could help personalise treatment, as it would allow the tailoring of treatment to the genetic make-up of an individual's cancer.
The disease is known to be caused by mutations in the ACVR1 gene, which codes for a receptor protein that controls bone
The mutations make this protein much more active than usual, resulting in the formation of extra bones.
as a biotechnology company with expertise in developing antibodies, they are in a position to act on it
#eyond revolutionary bioreactor-in-a-briefcase brings warzone production The project, sponsored by a coalition including Thermo Fisher, Pfizer,
Speaking at Bioprocess International conference in Boston on Tuesday, Rao described the team breakthrough in large molecule manufacturing as eyond revolutionary my head is still spinning.?
and streptokinase cross three bioreactors. One-and-a-half hours and youe done. igarette pack reactorsrao team has created 3d printed designs for their next goal:
flat-chip bioreactors the size of cigarette packs for continuous processing. The scientists are also working on making purification portable.
and to be replaced with manufacturing at the point of care specific threat response without requiring specific preparedness. ao told Tuesday conference moving biomanufacturing to the front lines echoes the decentralisation of pharma supply chains to civilians,
#eyond revolutionary bioreactor-in-a-briefcase brings warzone production The project, sponsored by a coalition including Thermo Fisher, Pfizer,
Speaking at Bioprocess International conference in Boston on Tuesday, Rao described the team breakthrough in large molecule manufacturing as eyond revolutionary my head is still spinning. elcome to Betty Crocker bioprocessing
and streptokinase cross three bioreactors. One-and-a-half hours and youe done. Cigarette pack reactors Rao team has created 3d printed designs for their next goal:
flat-chip bioreactors the size of cigarette packs for continuous processing. The scientists are also working on making purification portable.
Rao told Tuesday conference moving biomanufacturing to the front lines echoes the decentralisation of pharma supply chains to civilians,
"This memristor-based technology relies on a completely different way inspired by biological brain to carry on computation."
which integrats the ultrafast laser with molecular biology and cell biology. Professor Lu has applied the tool to understand the molecular mechanisms that cause cancer at the very moment
"With the novel femtomedicine approach we can go back to the very beginning to find out what causes DNA damage in the first place, then mutation, and then cancer."
The Stanford sleuths analyzed a number of publicly available data sets containing results of studies that had assessed activity levels for the entire human genome in sepsis cases,
Daniel Moran, Ph d.,professor of biomedical engineering in the School of engineering & Applied science and of neurobiology, of physical therapy and of neurological surgery at Washington University School of medicine in St louis
Patients with Down syndrome have three copies of chromosome 21 in their cells. Theye also 20 times more likely to contract childhood B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia than the general population,
making that chromosome an important avenue for researching the genetic basis of the cancer. major goal of my laboratory is to identify the specific gene or genes on chromosome 21 responsible for the increased incidence of leukemia in this population,
. and Lora S. Lurie Professor in Medicine-Hematology/Oncology and Biochemistry and Molecular genetics, and a member of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University.
In previous work, Crispino and colleagues found that a gene on chromosome 21 called DYRK1A contributes to the development of leukemia.
Because they have extra copies of chromosome 21, children with Down syndrome have more DYRK1A than usual. his finding is exciting to us
and professor in the department of Anesthesiology and Radiology at Stony Brook University School of medicine in New york told Bioscience Technology that it is too early to comment on humans,
Benveniste told Bioscience Technology. Read More: Researchers Discover Missing Link Between Brain and Immune Systemshe explained how the system lushesout waste:
Benveniste told Bioscience Technology. Benveniste and colleagues used dynamic contrast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to image the glymphatic pathway at work in rodentsbrains.
Bioscience Technology. Imaging testing in humans is needed still. Up next Benveniste and colleagues are working to study how the glymphatic system can be controlled
and other cells interact in the body is somewhat difficult in the lab. Biologists generally culture one cell type in plastic plates,
Now MIT spinout AIM Biotech has developed a microfluidics device based on years of research that lets researchers co-culture multiple cell types in a 3d hydrogel environment that mimics natural tissue.
said AIM Biotech cofounder Roger Kamm, the Cecil H. Green Distinguished Professor in MIT departments of mechanical engineering and biological engineering. f you want realistic models of these processes,
you have to go to a 3d matrix, with multiple cell types to see cell-to-cell contact
AIM Biotech will begin deploying the commercial devices to 47 research groups in 13 countries for user feedback.
AIM Biotech devices, on the other hand, he said, can be put directly under the microscope like a traditional plate,
IM Biotech launched in Singapore in 2012, under current CEO Kuan Chee Mun, who Kamm met through SMART.
AIM Biotech microfluidics device produces a similar microenvironment: When endothelial cells are seeded into the side channels or the central gel region,
AIM Biotech may offer to more accurately screen cancer drugs for pharmaceutical companies. In fact, he said, AIM Biotech recently discovered that its devices revealed discrepancies in some clinically tested therapeutics.
In a study published in Integrative biology, MIT researchers used Kamm's microfluidics technology to screen several drugs that aim to prevent tumors from breaking up
and dispersing throughout the body. Results indicated that the level of drugs needed was often two orders of magnitude higher than predictions based on traditional assaid. o there no way to effectively predict, from the 2-D assaid,
In addition to the direct medical implications, the new study also shifts a fundamental principle of biochemistry known as allostery.
Previously, scientists believed that allosteric regulation of glucokinase depended on strict structural transitions of the biomolecule.
#Degenerating Neurons Respond to Gene therapy Treatment for Alzheimer Disease Degenerating neurons in patients with Alzheimer disease (AD) measurably responded to an experimental gene therapy in
The gene therapy approach has progressed since to phase II trials at multiple test sites. Results have not yet been released.
"said Chase Beisel, co-senior author of the paper and an assistant professor in the department of chemical and biomolecular engineering at NC State."
"said Zhen Gu, co-senior author of the paper and an assistant professor in the joint biomedical engineering program at NC State and UNC-CH."
professor at the Department of Biosciences and Nutrition at Karolinska Institutet and also affiliated to the Scilifelab facility.
'but are in fact important in regulating gene expression. In the current study, the researchers show that the newly identified genes can interact with the'junk DNA,
According to study senior investigator and NYU Langone microbiologist Victor Torres, Phd, the newly discovered competing or ntagonisticrelationship between the two bacterial toxins helps explain how community-acquired MRSA is far more widespread and less deadly than hospital
His team next plans to analyze the biological mechanisms by which LUK-PV and LUK-ED target, attach
Ball said. he discovery raises new questions about STAT3 biology and points the way to future anticancer approaches, including combination therapies of coiled-coil STAT3 inhibitors in tandem with other agents,
and structure of phosphoproteins and identify which ones are involved in disease. his innovation will help advance the understanding of human biochemistry and physiology,
a biochemical engineer who led the Northwestern team. The study was published Sept. 9 by the journal Nature Communications.
Jewett, associate professor of chemical and biological engineering at Northwestern Mccormick School of engineering, and his team worked with Yale colleagues led by Jesse Rinehart.
As a synthetic biologist, Jewett uses cell-free systems to create new therapies, chemicals and novel materials to impact public health
and the environment. his work addresses the broader question of how can we repurpose the protein synthesis machinery of the cell for synthetic biology,
Jewett said. ere we are finding new ways to leverage this machinery to understand fundamental biological questions, specifically protein phosphorylation.
Jewett and his colleagues combined state-of-the-art genome engineering tools and engineered biological artsinto a lug-and-playprotein expression platform that is cell-free.
Cell-free systems activate complex biological systems without using living intact cells. Crude cell lysates, or extracts, are employed instead.
Specifically, the researchers prepared cell lysates of genomically recoded bacteria that incorporate amino acids not found in nature.
capable of on-demand biomanufacturing new classes of proteins. his manufacturing technology will enable scientists to decrypt the phosphorylation odethat exists in the human proteome,
#SAM-Screener Epigenetic Methylation Test The United states Patent and Trademark Office has issued a patent to Cayman Chemical
These epigenetic modifications regulate gene expression, impacting normal growth as well as cancer and disease. Dysregulation of histone methylation patterns is observed in a variety of human cancers, inflammation,
Custom assay development to adapt this assay format to other HMTS is also available through Cayman epigenetic screening
. who now works in biopharmaceutical research and development at Glaxosmithkline, published their results in the journal Lab on a Chip in addition to being able to use less fluid,
Ghodbane advisor, Martin Yarmush, the Paul and Mary Monroe Chair and Distinguished Professor of biomedical engineering at Rutgers, said the results are as accurate and sensitive as the standard benchtop assay. ith our technology,
t essential that we continue to research basic biology to further understand how cells become cancerous.
and counteracts the effects of the mutation. Other studies have indicated that sickle-cell patients with elevated levels of fetal hemoglobin have a milder form of the disease.
rather than fix the hemoglobin mutation, but to do so in very precise ways that are only possible
Although fixing the sickle mutation itself would seem the most straightforward approach, it turns out that blood stem cells,
Researchers at Johns hopkins university School of medicine, Johns hopkins university Department of Chemical and Biomolecular engineering and Federal University of Rio de janeiro in Brazil conducted a proof-of-concept study that found DNA-loaded nanoparticles could successfully pass through the hard-to-breach mucus barrier
a biomedical engineer and faculty member at the Center for Nanomedicine at the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins. Researchers funded by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering meanwhile,
stopped brain cancer in rats by delivering gene therapy through nanoparticles. The nanoparticles deliver genes for an enzyme that converts a prodrug called ganciclovir into a glioma cell killer.
As in cystic fibrosis, a current delivery method of gene therapy relies on using a virus, which can pose significant safety risks.
explained M. Laura Feltri, M d.,senior author on the paper and an HJKRI researcher and professor of biochemistry and neurology in the Jacobs School of medicine and Biomedical sciences at UB. o study myelin,
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