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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 1, 2022 at 10:09am

Scientists discover new DNA modification system in animals, captured from bacteria more than 60 million years ago

Your DNA holds the blueprint to build your body, but it's a living document: Adjustments to the design can be made by epigenetic marks.

Epigenetic marks are modifications to DNA bases that don't change the underlying genetic code, but "write" extra information on top of it that can be inherited along with your genome. Epigenetic marks usually regulate gene expression—turn genes on or off—particularly during early development or when your body is under stress. They can also suppress "jumping genes"—transposable elements that threaten the integrity of your genome.

In humans and other eukaryotes, two principal epigenetic marks are known. A team from the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) has discovered a third, novel epigenetic mark—one formerly known only in bacteria—in bdelloid rotifers, small freshwater animals. This fundamental and surprising discovery is reported this week in Nature Communications.

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 1, 2022 at 10:04am

Indian Ocean warming could weaken summer monsoon rainfall in South Asia

The South Asian monsoon, also known as Indian summer monsoon (ISM), is crucial for the food security and socioeconomic well-being of 40% of the world's population. From a historical perspective, fluctuations in monsoon rainfall have been linked to the rise and fall of civilizations in the Indian subcontinent. Now researchers are increasingly concerned that global warming may threaten the stability of the monsoon system, but accurate predictions have been hampered by the lack of long-term climate data in the Indian subcontinent.

A new study in the journal PNAS by a team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kiel University and the Alfred Wegener Institute of the Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, seeks to strengthen climate predictions by reconstructing Indian summer monsoon rainfall changes during the past 130,000 years.

The study reports for the first time that the Indian summer monsoon during the Last Interglacial was weakened by sustained high sea surface temperatures in the equatorial and tropical Indian Ocean, indicating that modern rises in sea temperature could increase droughts in South Asia.

 Higher sea surface temperature in the Indian Ocean during the Last Interglacial weakened the South Asian monsoon, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2107720119

https://phys.org/news/2022-02-indian-ocean-weaken-summer-monsoon.ht...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 28, 2022 at 7:24am

Touch sensitive brain cells controlled by micromagnets

Scientists have developed a new technique that uses microscopic magnetic particles to remotely activate brain cells; researchers say the discovery in rats could potentially lead to the development of a new class of non-invasive therapies for neurological disorders.

Published in Advanced Science, the pioneering technique called "magnetomechanical stimulation" or , allows touch sensitive brain glial cells called astrocytes to be stimulated with a magnetic device outside the body.

Microscopic magnetic particles, or micromagnets, are attached to astrocytes, and used as miniature mechanical switches that can turn "on" the cells when a strong magnet is placed near the head.

Astrocytes are star-shaped cells found throughout the brain. They are strategically positioned between the brain blood vessels and nerve cells. These cells provide neurons with essential metabolic and structural support, modulate neuronal circuit activity and may also function as versatile surveyors of brain milieu, tuned to sense conditions of potential metabolic insufficiency.

The ability to control brain astrocytes using a magnetic field gives the researchers a new tool to study the function of these cells in health and disease that may be important for future development of novel and effective treatments for some common neurological disorders, such as epilepsy and stroke.

Because astrocytes are sensitive to touch, decorating them with magnetic particles means you can give the cells a tiny prod from outside the body using a magnet, and as such, control their function. This ability to remotely control astrocytes provides a new tool for understanding their function and may have the potential to treat brain disorders.

The  new technology uses magnetic particles and magnets to remotely and precisely control brain cell activity and, importantly, does this without introducing any device or foreign gene into the brain.

In the laboratory-based study, researchers coated microscopic magnetic particles with an antibody that enables them to bind specifically to astrocytes. The particles were then delivered to the target brain region in the rat via injection.

Another advantage of using micromagnets is that they light up on an MRI scan so we can track their location and target very particular parts of the brain to get precise control of brain function. 

Yichao Yu, Christopher Payne, Nephtali Marina, Alla Korsak, Paul Southern, Ana García‐Prieto, Isabel N. Christie, Rebecca R. Baker, Elizabeth M. C. Fisher, Jack A. Wells, Tammy L. Kalber, Quentin A. Pankhurst, Alexander V. Gourine, Mark F. Lythgoe. Remote and Selective Control of Astrocytes by Magnetomechanical Stimulation. Advanced Science, 2021; 2104194 DOI: 10.1002/advs.202104194

https://researchnews.cc/news/11846/Touch-sensitive-brain-cells-cont...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 27, 2022 at 2:40pm

Cutting emissions with sharkskin technology

https://techxplore.com/news/2022-02-aeroshark-thin-airplanes.html?u...

blog.swiss.com/en/2022/02/aero … -reduzieren-english/

www.lufthansa-technik.com/aeroshark

Part2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 27, 2022 at 2:29pm

AeroSHARK thin film reduces drag on airplanes

A collaboration between engineers at Lufthansa Technik and chemicals and coatings manufacturer BASF has resulted in the creation of AeroSHARK—a thin film coating that can be applied to an aircraft's outer skin to reduce drag and thus fuel consumption and carbon emissions. 

The thin film was developed as part of an effort kicked off by engineers at Lufthansa looking for ways to reduce the cost of fuel for their planes. To that end, they looked to nature, and more specifically, sharks—creatures who have been streamlined over millions of years of evolution. The researchers found that shark skin is covered with millions of "riblets," which are protrusions that run the length of their bodies. The engineers then teamed up with a group at BASF to create a similar type of skin for aircraft. The result was the creation of AeroSHARK, a clear, thin skin with millions of riblets, each just 50 micrometers high. Testing showed that the material reduces drag.

The researchers found that by applying the skin to the entire fuselage and engines of a Boeing 777, they could reduce fuel consumption by 1.1%. Swiss estimates that the skin will result in reductions in fuel consumption across its fleet by 4,800 metric tons a year, which, in turn, will result in reducing carbon emissions by 15,200 metric tons.

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 26, 2022 at 12:50pm

This result was critical, because it is important that any alternative to genetic modification be able to achieve the same functional outcome.

Lastly, the researchers were able to similarly silence genes specific to chloroplasts when they included a chloroplast-targeting peptide to a specific CPP-RNA complex.

Mitochondria and chloroplasts regulate much of a plant's metabolic activity. Targeting these structures with bioactive molecules delivered via spray could effectively improve economically desirable quality traits in crops. 

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 26, 2022 at 12:49pm

Nanocarrier spray: Better crops without genetic modification

Researchers  have developed a way to improve crop quality without needing to create special genetically modified plants. Rather that changing plant genomes, the new technique relies on a spray that introduces bioactive molecules into plant cells through their leaves. The new technology could be used to help crops resist pests or become more resistant to drought—in less time and at less cost than making lines of genetically modified crops. The study was reported in the scientific journal ACS Nano.

Making transgenic plants  takes time, money, and still has not gained widespread public support. So an alternative to GM food that can overcome these problems have to be looked into. For example, rather than changing a plant's genome so that it doesn't express a particular gene, the same gene can be suppressed on the go by inserting a specific bioactive compound into the plant. In this scenario, the bioactive compound is taken into the plant's cells by a carrier that can penetrate the cell walls of plant cells.

While the concept might be simple, making it happen was a challenge. "In addition to designing a way to introduce bioactive molecules into the plants. Researchers have to consider a delivery method that would be practical for cultivated crops under real agricultural conditions. The best method would be through a spray that could be deployed over large fields relatively easily.

Many types of nanoparticles can penetrate plant cells. The researchers focused on cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) because they can also target specific structures inside plants cells, such as chloroplasts. The first challenge was to determine which CPPs are best when using a spray. They tagged natural and synthetic CPPs with fluorescent yellow, sprayed them on plant leaves, and measured the amount of fluorescence in the leaves with a confocal laser-scanning microscope at different time points. After performing this procedure in typical laboratory Arabidopsis thaliana, as well as in several types of soybeans and tomatoes, they found several natural CPPs that were able to penetrate into the outer layer of the leaves, and in some cases even deeper.

Further experiments showed that this technique worked well when plasmid DNA was attached to the CPPs, and analysis showed that genes were effectively expressed in the leaves of both A. thaliana and soybeans after being carried into the cells through an aqueous spray. The researchers also found that by including other biomolecules and nanostructures in the spray solution, they could temporarily increase the number of pores in the leaves, which increased how much spray was taken up by the plant.

Often, crop yield can be improved by inserting or knocking out genes. After creating a transgenic plant that overexpresses yellow fluorescence in the leaves, the team attached RNA that interferes with fluorescent protein expression to a CPP. As hoped, spraying the leaves with this complex silenced yellow florescence expression.

Chonprakun Thagun et al, Non-transgenic Gene Modulation via Spray Delivery of Nucleic Acid/Peptide Complexes into Plant Nuclei and Chloroplasts, ACS Nano (2022). DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.1c07723

https://phys.org/news/2022-02-nanocarrier-crops-genetic-modificatio...

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 26, 2022 at 12:40pm

Entering danger zones to avoid them! Planes Fly into Snowstorms to Study Snowfall

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2022 at 11:37am

Largest bacterium ever discovered

A newly discovered bacterium, Thiomargarita magnifica, challenges the definition of a microbe: its filament-like single cell is up to 2 centimetres long. T. magnifica achieves its unprecedented size by having unique cellular features: two membrane sacs. One is filled with its genetic material; the other, which is much larger, helps to keep its cellular contents pressed up against its outer cell wall so that the molecules it needs can diffuse in and out. Researchers have dubbed these sacs ‘pepins’ — inspired by the pips in fruit — and note that they blur the line between single-celled prokaryotes and eukaryotes (the group that includes humans), which pack their DNA into a nucleus.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.02.16.480423v1.full.pd...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2022 at 11:33am

Diseased male livers undergo sex-change

The livers of men diagnosed with hepatic diseases change sex as part of a potential self-protective mechanism, according to new research.

The surprise discovery was made during an investigation into why disruption of the body’s circadian clock is associated with obesity, type 2 diabetes and liver diseases.

When a high-fat diet was fed to mice that had their circadian clock gene turned off, researchers  expected them to develop diabetes or non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) like the control mice, but they didn’t! Instead they found that the liver of the obese male mice had been feminised probably due in part to the protective nature of the female sex hormone, oestrogen.

Like reproductive organs, the liver is sexually dimorphic, which means there are significant differences between the metabolic function of male and female livers.

The research team then went on to study human samples and got the same results. The more advanced the disease, the more feminisation they saw in the liver tissue.

It appears that the disruption of circadian rhythms might be protecting the liver by influencing the levels of hormones such as growth hormone, oestrogen and testosterone.

The internal body clock controls many biological functions including sleep, hormone secretion, body temperature and metabolism. This study suggests that the disruption of the circadian clock gives the body flexibility in metabolic pathways that can help to slow down disease progression.

Disruption of the circadian clock component BMAL1 elicits an endocrine adaption impacting on insulin sensitivity and liver disease, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2022). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2200083119.

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