A once-a-month electronic newsletter of basic, preclinical and translational
research news from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Please forward
freely. Browse back issues of the e-Newsletter in the archive.
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RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS:
Balancing the Divide
Protein Chips Ahoy
Malaria Invasion
NEWS BRIEFS:
Center for Sensory Biology Inaugural Symposium on Nov. 13
Three Hopkins Researchers Elected to Institute of Medicine
Harry Dietz Receives Curt Stern Award
Research Rounds: Nerve Regeneration Update on Nov. 30
Hot Off the Press: The Beginning of the Age of Mammals
IGM Seminar: Reconstructing 100 Million Years of Human Evolutionary History
New Stem Cell Resource Center Will Provide Challenge Grants
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RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS:
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10/10/06
Balancing the Divide
When a cell divides, it must make sure that in pinching apart into two, it does so evenly; failure to do so can lead to tumors or other problems. It turns out that lopsided cells can prevent asymmetrical division by moving certain proteins around to correct for uneven cell shape. By recording time-lapse movies of slime mold cells containing glowing proteins, Douglas Robinson and colleagues have shown that a protein called myosin-II does indeed redistribute within the cell to correct for cell-shape changes. Using a microscopic straw to partially suck up—and warp—one side of a cell, they’ve shown that cells slow down their division times to allow myosin-II protein to redistribute and correct for the shape change. Lopsided cells not undergoing division don’t change their myosin-II distribution.
Read the paper here:
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10/11/06
Protein Chips Ahoy
So-called high-throughput biology has led to the discovery of thousands of new proteins. Now scientists face the challenge of trying to figure out what all these proteins do. High-throughput protein biology—studying many different proteins at the same time—has been more challenging because proteins are more finicky and less amenable to handling en masse. Now, Heng Zhu and colleagues in the HiT (high throughput biology) Center have developed new strategies for capturing newly made proteins on chips to make protein microarrays. The new technique circumvents the need to individually purify proteins and spot them onto chips. Instead, the proteins are translated directly onto the chips.
Read the paper here:
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10/13/06
Malaria Invasion
Successful malaria infection requires the malaria parasite, Plasmodium, to grab onto the host’s blood cells, shove its way into the cell and cut its connection to the cell’s surface once it’s inside. Sinisa Urban and colleagues in Molecular Biology and Genetics have discovered the enzymes responsible for severing the parasite from the cell membrane. It’s thought that different adhesins—proteins on the parasite used to grab onto host cells—are used by different parasite strains to invade different blood types. The newly discovered enzymes, it turns out, can cleave different types of adhesins. Figuring out a way to block these enzymes might lead to new drugs to prevent malaria spread.
Read the paper here:
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NEWS BRIEFS:
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Center for Sensory Biology Inaugural Symposium on Nov. 13
WHAT: "Sensory Biology: Understanding Our Windows to the World"
WHEN: Monday, Nov. 13, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
WHERE: Vernon B. Mountcastle Auditorium, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, 725 N. Wolfe St., Baltimore, MD 21205
Speaker list and event description can be found here:
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Three Hopkins Researchers Elected to Institute of Medicine
Three Johns Hopkins University researchers have been elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine. Robert Blum, M.D., M.P.H., Ph.D., Scott Zeger, Ph.D., and Chi Van Dang, M.D., Ph.D., are among 65 new members nationwide. Election to this prestigious body affirms their remarkable contributions to medical science, health care and public health, as well as to the education of generations of physicians. It is one of the highest honors for those in the biomedical profession.
Read the press release here:
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Harry Dietz Receives Curt Stern Award
Harry Dietz, M.D., professor of pediatrics and investigator in the McKusick-Nathans Institute of Genetic Medicine and Howard Hughes Medical Institute, was awarded the Stern Award at the annual meeting of the American Society for Human Genetics. The Stern Award honors the memory of Curt Stern (1902-1981) as a pioneering human geneticist and recognizes outstanding scientific achievements in human genetics. The award was presented by Victor McKusick, M.D., to Dietz for his "devotion to Marfan syndrome in the clinic and in the laboratory since 1991, his description and molecular characterization of the Marfan-like disorder that bears his name, Loeys-Dietz syndrome, and his spectacular work on the pathogenesis and rational treatment of Marfan syndrome."
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Research Rounds: Nerve Regeneration Update
WHO: Presented by Dr. Thomas Brushart and Dr. Feng-Quan Zhou, Sponsored by the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery
WHEN: Thursday, Nov. 30, 7 a.m.
WHERE: Johns Hopkins Outpatient Center, Orthopaedic Conference Room 5152
CONTACT: Norma Jean Simonsen 410-955-8344
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Hot Off the Press: The Beginning of the Age of Mammals
Nearly all of today’s known mammals appeared for the first time in the 15 million years after dinosaurs went extinct. Although there were mammals that co-existed with dinosaurs, these too went extinct, and none was larger than a modern dog?most were small and rodent-like. So, what happened in that time following dinosaur extinction that led to the apparent explosion of different types of mammals? Focusing on the fossil record, Kenneth D. Rose, professor of functional anatomy and evolution at Hopkins, has written a new book published by the Johns Hopkins University Press that analyzes the anatomy and behavior of different groups of mammals and summarizes events that may have led to today’s extensive diversity of mammals.
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IGM Seminar: Reconstructing 100 Million Years of Human Evolutionary History
WHO: David Haussler, Professor of Biomolecular Engineering, UC Santa Cruz
WHEN: Thursday, Nov. 16, 1 p.m.
WHERE: Tilghman Auditorium
Dr. Haussler will discuss his current work reconstructing the genome of the common ancestor of all placental mammals. From this, scientists hope to be able to document most of the genomic changes that occured in the evolution of humans over the past 100 million years. Understanding these changes promises insights into human health and disease.
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ICE’s New Stem Cell Resource Center Will Provide Challenge Grants
Using a small portion of a $100 million anonymous gift to The Johns Hopkins University earlier this year, the Institute for Cell Engineering at Hopkins has set up a "one-stop shop" to preserve, create, supply and test high-quality cell lines for its own researchers now and for the greater scientific community later. The new center offers streamlined and centralized handling of cell lines and of requests to use them and is expected to cut wait times and paperwork substantially.
In tandem with the opening of the new center, Hopkins has appointed an eight-person Embryonic Stem Cell Research Oversight?ESCRO?committee modeled on guidelines set forth in 2005 by the National Academies. Similar to institutional review boards that oversee the safety of human subjects in research, the ESCRO committee’s charge is to ensure that all human stem-cell experiments conducted at the University are safe.
ICE also will provide ICE Challenge Grants on a peer-reviewed, competitive basis, enabling investigators to be competitive for the upcoming Maryland state funding for stem-cell research. The challenge grants will provide a 20 percent additional match, up to a total of $100,000 to match state grant applications with $500,000 or higher budgets. The ICE program includes one additional renewable year of funding, contingent on progress, to grants that receive state funding. Application deadline: Nov. 6.
For more information, contact Kai Sauer.
Read the press release here:
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Find Change and Basics online from a Hopkins computer.
Visit Research WebNotes online.
Read Hopkins press releases online.
Upcoming lectures and seminars are listed on the Science Calendar.
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-- JHM --
