The Scientist
Video: Neuroscientist Sergiu Pasca on his pioneering efforts to grow brain organoids from stem cells
When [Stanford University brain researcher Sergiu] Pasca started his own lab at the university in 2014, he continued working on ...
Infographic: These blood biomarkers could be critical to diagnosing, treating Alzheimer’s
Researchers are investigating a host of molecules found in the blood that could reveal pathological processes in the brain. Here ...
Pursuit of ‘speech prosthetic’ for people who’ve lost the ability to talk could be boosted by this discovery
One [area of the brain is called] the “hand knob,” which, as the name suggests, is a knobby region of ...
Why finding a blood test for Alzheimer’s could be the key to new treatments
Alzheimer’s patients who were at earlier stages of the disease did better than those with more advanced cognitive decline [in ...
Was it ‘bad luck’—not ancient humans—that drove Neanderthals to extinction?
Neanderthals may have gone extinct due to chance, and not, as some researchers previously thought, due to competition for resources ...
New dengue fever defense? Mosquitoes infected with common bacteria can’t transmit dangerous virus
Mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia bacteria and released into the wild are associated with a sharp decrease in dengue fever infections in humans, ...
More children sickened by polio vaccine than by wild virus
Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, and Angola have experienced nine new cases of polio caused by the ...
Universal ecology: Laws of physics and mathematics apply across the universe. Are there biological laws?
On Earth, bacteria grow exponentially, lynx eat hares, and red panda populations decline due to habitat loss and fragmentation. How ...
Does the keto diet offer protection against the flu?
Mice fed a ketogenic diet—in which 90 percent of calories come from fat and less than 1 percent from carbohydrates—were ...
Infographic: Creating artificial human chromosomes
To convert a piece of cloned DNA into a centromere-containing human artificial chromosome (HAC), an array of repeated LacO sequences ...
Cancer cells alter mutation rates to survive targeted therapies. Researchers want to know how they do it.
In response to antibiotic treatment, bacteria improve their odds of survival by increasing the rate of mutations in their genomes, ...
China’s new Alzheimer drug greeted with ‘surprise and skepticism’ by researchers
China’s approval of the drug oligomannate earlier this month for treating mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease has been met with surprise and ...
Children from extramarital affairs not as common as we think, study shows
That old joke about the milkman fathering many of a town’s children—it’s far from true, a new study reaffirms. Researchers ...
What makes a murderer? MRI scans reveal reduced gray matter patterns in convicts
Kent Kiehl and his research team regularly park their long, white trailer just outside the doors of maximum-security prisons across the ...
Neural stem cell transplants show promise for treating stroke, Parkinson’s, spinal injuries
Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease is a genetic malady that leaves neurons without their myelin coating. This deficit has devastating consequences for the ...
Chicxulub asteroid impact sparked mammal growth surge, fossil ‘trove’ shows
After an asteroid crashed into what is now Chicxulub, Mexico 66 million years ago, a chain of events occurred that ...
Viewpoint: New antibiotics won’t save us from drug-resistant bacterial infections
Of course, there is an ongoing search for new safe and effective antibiotics, but agents are very difficult to find ...
Brain organoids may have ‘critical’ research limitation: Imperfect modeling of human development
Despite their potential, [brain] organoids still have some critical limitations. In a study presented [October 22] at the Society for Neuroscience meeting ...
ISIS leader al-Baghdadi’s remains may have been identified with new rapid DNA testing technology
On Sunday (October 27), President Donald Trump announced that US Special Operations forces had cornered Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the current ...
Deafness edited out of human eggs by Russian researcher. No plans for gene-edited babies—yet
Russian biologist Denis Rebrikov has started editing the GJB2 gene, associated with deafness, in human eggs donated by women who ...
Engineered molecule could protect key food crops from intensifying droughts as climate changes
An engineered small molecule called opabactin that targets the receptor for the hormone abscisic acid (ABA), which plants release in ...
‘Time to stop debating’: Researchers blame enterovirus for mysterious polio-like paralysis in kids
A team of researchers has published evidence that an enterovirus is to blame for a mysterious neurologic illness that has ...
‘Brain drain’ increases genetic inequality between wealthy, poor regions in UK study
An unintended side effect of merit-based social mobility is that it stimulates selective migration; people with a higher education are ...
Commercialization without consent: Sanger Institute accused of violating agreements with African scientists
The Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK had planned to commercialize a genetics array based on African DNA samples, whistleblowers ...
‘Gross and dangerous”: Genetic test for same-sex attraction condemned by scientists
In August, a group of researchers published the results of a massive genome-wide association study on homosexual behavior. The take-home message ...
What does a healthy human gut virome look like? Study shows that we have no idea
There’s a lot that scientists don’t know about the gut microbiota, and when it comes to the viruses present there ...
‘Defibrillator for the brain’: Implant could prevent epileptic seizures in autistic children
Kevin, who has autism and has had seizures since he was 8 years old, lies uncharacteristically still in the center ...
‘If you get better, you stay better’: Deep brain stimulation could offer long-lasting depression treatment
Deep brain stimulation can durably improve depression symptoms in people who don’t respond well to other treatments, according to a ...
