A recent study led by Nitin Gupta, Associate Professor, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, have questioned how mosquitoes can detect hundreds of odourants to find human hosts. In contrast to dedicated neural pathways for every odourant, the team of researchers discovered that a combinatorial action of multiple neurons for each odourant is the key to solving the puzzle.
In a new study, researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Gandhinagar and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, have demonstrated the functioning of a motor protein responsible for recycling material inside a cell. These findings are crucial since faulty recycling in cells is responsible for many disorders including Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease, and Cancer.
Posted on in Cell Biology, Molecular Biology, Biophysics & Research
Aggregation of amyloid proteins is believed to play a central role in many neurodegenerative diseases, including Parkinson's disease. Now, a collaborative study by Indian researchers has explored certain key biophysical processes that are involved in the initial steps of this process, providing us with an important clue about the early stages of Parkinson's disease progression.
Macrophages are an important category of immune cells that patrol our body to find and destroy pathogens, often by swallowing them whole - a process known as phagocytosis. A recent study by researchers at the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (IACS), Kolkata, has discovered how the physical properties of macrophages change in response to phagocytosis and how this, in turn, affects their function.
The question of how stem cells can differentiate to give rise to multiple different cell lineages has fascinated biologists for years. Now, a team of researchers from the Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMSc), Chennai and Ashoka University, Sonepat, have come up with a theoretical model that links the physical properties of the stem cell nucleus to its eventual fate.
In order to treat severe burn wounds, the progress of healing needs to be monitored regularly. This is usually done by measuring collagen levels using biochemical or histopathological methods. Now, researchers from the Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, have come up with a way to assess burn wound healing by using a minimally-invasive laser-based method to optically measure collagen.
Posted on in Health & Medicine, Biophysics, Research & Interdisciplinarity
Physical forces play a major role in how the cells in our brain grow and signal to each other. In a recent study, scientists from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Pune, Raman Research Institute (RRI), Bangalore, and University of Hyderabad developed a simple assay to show that neurons are shaped by attachment to the substrate underneath them.
Posted on in Neuroscience, Biophysics, Research & Interdisciplinarity