Voyager 2: Image Of The Planet Neptune, NASA  Photography

SUPERSLIPPERY SIDE UP

These two steel balls sit in a pool of octane, a component of petroleum, that has been dyed yellow. Though the ball on the left has picked up streaks of the oily liquid, the ball on the right has repelled the octane thanks to a self-healing, superslippery coating called X-SLIPS. Researchers developed this coating, which repels both water and oil, based on the slippery interiors of Nepenthes pitcher plants and the wax layer on plant leaves. To make the coating, the team applied a 2.5- µm-thick layer of fluorinated silane to the sanded surface of the ball. A spritz of DuPont’s Krytox lubricant, a perfluorinated oil similar to Teflon, adheres tightly to the silane to create a surface that fends off water and oil. After damaging the coating with blasts of oxygen plasma or abuse with 40-grit sandpaper, the researchers could restore it by simply heating it, causing the remaining silane to redistribute across the surface and re-adhere. The coating could be useful on ships or in condiment packaging.

Credit: Tak-Sing Wong/ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 2016, DOI: 10.1021/acsami.6b00194

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CRISPR/Cas Just Got About One Hundred Million Dollars Hotter

CRISPR Therapeutics and Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated announced  that they will be entering into a 105 million USD strategic research collaboration focused on developing therapeutics for genetic disease.

In more detail, what does that mean? A number of genetic mutations are responsible for inherited diseases, and two examples of this are cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anaemia.

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is caused by mutations within the CFTR gene which lead to a broken or non-folding protein, this in turn prevents the proper dilution of mucosal secretions and thus leads to numerous pathologies. Sickle cell anaemia/disease, by contrast, is due to mutations within the gene coding for haemoglobin leading to protein aggregation and disruption of red blood cell structures. It is predominantly found in descendants from malaria-prone areas, as the mutation – at least in heterozygotes – provides innate resistance against malarial infection.

The collaboration between Vertex and CRISPR will initially focus on developing therapeutics for cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anaemia, with other unspecified genes also on the target list

Full Story: Syniobeta

We were just discussing in class today in the context of ubiquinated H2B. Neat!

Ubiquitin is a regulatory protein found in most tissues of many walled-celled organisms.  Originally known as  ubiquitous immunopoietic polypeptide, ubiquitin was discovered in 1975 and its mechanism identified by a team including  Aaron Ciechanover, Avram Hershko, and Irwin Rose of the Fox Chase Cancer Center, for which they were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2004.  Ubiquitins act as traffic control agents within the cell, directing other proteins to various compartments within the cell including tagging proteins for destruction.  

The word ubiquitin was formed in 1975 from the English adjective ubiquitous which dates only from 1837.  Ubiquitous derives from the noun ubiquitary which dates from 1580s from the Latin preposition ubi meaning where and que meaning any, also, ever.  Ubiquitary (meaning everywhere) originally referred to the Luthern doctrine that Christ is omnipresent.  

Representation of ubiquitin protein, highlighting the secondary structure. α-helices are coloured in blue and β-strands in green. The sidechains of the 7 lysine residues are indicated by orange sticks. The two best-characterised attachment points for further ubiquitin molecules in polyubiquitin chain formation (lysines 48 & 63) are labelled.

Image of ubiquitin protein courtesy rogerdodd under a Creative Commons 3.0 license, used with permission.

totally stealing this technique

Well how do you dry NMR caps?

Planet Saturn, observed by the Cassini space probe on March 16, 2016.

As soon as you think “maybe I can get up early and just finish it tomorrow” you’ve already lost

Structures from Nature

Image Gallery by David Walker, UK

source: microscopy-uk.org.uk