Molecular Awards

  The biological world is always expanding as research is constantly being done. Because of this, many findings often fall under the radar despite having the potential to change the world. Here are some of the most groundbreaking discoveries in biology from the past year. Slowing Huntington’s disease Scientists have found a way to slow the progress of Huntington’s disease, a deadly neurodegenerative disorder, by 75%. It is largely hereditary and causes a gradual decline in mental and physical functions. Until now, there have been very minimal treatment options. The new gene therapy treatment, called AMT-130, is “delivered deep into the brain during an eight- to 10-hour surgery,” said  Scientific American . A “safe virus” that has been genetically altered to contain a specific DNA sequence is “infused,” where it “acts like a microscopic postman” by “delivering the new piece of DNA inside brain cells,” said the  BBC . The treatment “turns the neurons into a factory for maki...

  Henninger studies gene expression , how the DNA genetic code is read out by the cell to instruct protein production. For a cell to express a gene, RNA molecules are first made as copies of the DNA and used to make specific proteins.  Henninger and others have found that RNA molecules can do more than carry a message from DNA: They directly influence multiple steps in gene expression. One way is by controlling tiny compartments inside cells formed by proteins and nucleic acids, called biomolecular condensates. These condensates act like specialized workstations, concentrating molecules that work together to orchestrate ongoing biological activity. “RNA acts as a very important scaffold that these condensates form around,” Henninger said. “If proteins were like chess pieces, where each one moves differently and plays different roles, DNA and RNA would be like the chessboard, which dictates how the pieces arrange and limits how they can move. There’s an intimate linkage between...

  This research not only fills a critical gap in our understanding of necrotic damage but also holds promise for developing innovative therapies for a wide range of medical conditions. Led by  Rob Harris , assistant professor in ASU's School of Life Sciences, the Harris Lab investigates how cells respond to necrotic damage — a poorly understood form of cell death caused by traumatic injuries, infections and common diseases such as heart attacks, strokes and diabetes. Necrosis, unlike the more controlled process of programmed cell death (apoptosis), often results in widespread tissue damage and inflammation. Understanding how tissues repair themselves in the aftermath of necrosis could transform treatment approaches for these conditions. The Harris Lab employs the larvae of the common fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) as a model organism. While small and seemingly simple, fruit flies possess a surprising ability to regenerate damaged organs after various types of injuries, in...

  When a child falls off her bike and scrapes her knee, skin stem cells rush to the rescue, growing new epidermis to cover the wound. But only some of the stem cells that will ultimately patch her up are normally dedicated to replenishing the epidermis that protects her body. Others are former hair follicle stem cells, which usually promote hair growth but respond to the more urgent needs of the moment, morphing into epidermal stem cells to bolster local ranks and repair efforts. To do that, these hair follicle stem cells first enter a pliable state in which they temporarily express the transcription factors of both types of stem cells, hair and epidermis. Now, new research published in  Science  demonstrates that once stem cells have entered this state, known as lineage plasticity, they cannot function effectively in either role until they choose a definitive fate. In a screen to identify key regulators of this process, retinoic acid, the biologically active form of Vita...

  Discovering new materials and drugs typically involves a manual, trial-and-error process that can take decades and cost millions of dollars. To streamline this process, scientists often use machine learning to predict molecular properties and narrow down the molecules they need to synthesize and test in the lab. Researchers from MIT and the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab have developed a  new, unified framework  that can simultaneously predict molecular properties and generate new molecules much more efficiently than these popular deep-learning approaches. To teach a machine-learning model to predict a molecule’s biological or mechanical properties, researchers must show it millions of labeled molecular structures — a process known as training. Due to the expense of discovering molecules and the challenges of hand-labeling millions of structures, large training datasets are often hard to come by, which limits the effectiveness of machine-learning approaches. By contrast, the sys...

  In science fiction movies like  Frankenstein  and  Re-Animator , human bodies are revived, existing in a strange state between life and death. While this may seem like pure fantasy, a recent study suggests that a “third state” of existence might actually be present in modern biology. The study, published in the journal  Physiology , was led by Professor Peter Noble from the  University of Washington in Seattle  and Alex Pozhitkov from the  City of Hope National Medical Center  in Duarte, California. “Life and death are traditionally viewed as opposites,” the researchers wrote in an article for  The Conversation . “But the emergence of new  multicellular life-forms  from the cells of a dead organism introduces a ‘third state’ that lies beyond the traditional boundaries of life and death.” Cells come alive after death In this third state, certain cells — when given nutrients, oxygen, bioelectricity, or biochemical signals — hav...

  Movement lets bacteria form communities, spread to new places or escape from danger. Understanding how they do it can help us develop new tools to fight against infections. In the first study, Navish Wadhwa and colleagues show that salmonella and E. coli can move across moist surfaces even when their flagella are disabled. As part of their metabolism, the bacteria ferment sugars and set up tiny outward currents on the moist surface. These currents carry the colony forward, like leaves drifting on a thin stream of water. The researchers call this new form of movement "swashing." It may help explain how harmful microbes successfully colonize  medical devices , wounds or food-processing surfaces. Understanding how metabolism drives bacterial movement could help researchers develop new techniques to limit infections, for example by changing local pH or sugar availability. "We were amazed by the ability of these bacteria to migrate across surfaces without functional flagell...