proteins

Back to the future for father of biotechnology

He’s back in the lab, working to convert the rich supply of stem cells found in the nose into specialised products to repair nerve damage or replace nerve cells lost in disorders such as hearing loss, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.

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Body’s power plants offer clues to Parkinson’s disease

How do the power plants of the cell—the mitochondria—use their defence mechanisms to fight diseases such as Parkinson’s disease? This debilitating disorder is caused by an accumulation of proteins that have folded incorrectly.

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Helping eyes to help themselves

Donor corneas conditioned with DNA before being transplanted into new eyes are already actively contributing to their own success in experimental animals such as sheep. The DNA is inserted into the cells of the cornea after it has been harvested. Then, following implantation, it produces proteins that help overcome immunological rejection.

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Fresh Science 2010

Each year we identify early-career scientists with a discovery and bring them to Melbourne for a communication boot camp. Here are some of their stories. More at www.freshscience.org.au Print your own lasers, lights and TV screens Imagine printing your own room lighting, lasers, or solar cells from inks you buy at the local newsagent. Jacek [...]

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Could we grow drugs using sunflowers?

Queensland researchers believe future cancer drugs could be grown in sunflowers and ultimately delivered as a seed ‘pill’. They’re a long way from that outcome. But, as they reported to the XVIII International Botanical Congress in Melbourne earlier this year, they have already shown that sunflowers make a precursor to cancer drugs as part of [...]

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Master switch turns plant sex life on and off

University of Melbourne researchers have isolated a genetic ‘switch’ that can be turned on or off to alter the development of sex cells in plants.

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Women at scientific forefront awarded new VESKI Innovation Fellowships

VESKI – Victorian Endowment for Science, Knowledge and Innovation – has awarded its latest Innovative Fellowships to two outstanding woman scientists.

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A milk protein that encourages exercise?

Victorian scientists have discovered a milk protein with the potential to treat metabolic syndrome and chronic muscular and bone diseases.

The protein, when given daily to mice, caused them not only to build more muscle but also to want to exercise. The findings also showed an increase in muscle in mice not given exercise.

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Know your enemy

Diseases such as leptospirosis, fowl cholera, bovine respiratory diseases or footrot in sheep have devastating impacts on livestock industries worldwide. They have a debilitating effect on animals, leading to food shortage and major economic losses.

Many of these diseases have proved difficult to control because we just don’t know enough about the enemy. We don’t know how various microbes interact to cause diseases such as footrot or bovine respiratory diseases.

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Kangaroo bacteria fight cancer

Australia’s iconic kangaroo may hold the secret for the war on cancer. Assoc. Prof. Ming Wei from the Griffith Institute of Health and Medical Research is using commensal bacteria found in kangaroos to develop anti-cancer agents that are expected to be effective in combating solid tumours, which account for up to 90 per cent of cancers.

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