news 2024

Motion illusion overrides compensatory mechanism for eye movements The visual perception of optical stimuli demands high performance from the brain. Every second, the eyes absorb more than ten million pieces of information and transmit them to the brain via thousands of nerve fibres. This leads us to perceive the world as stable, even though we are constantly moving our eyes.

New work on sleep in a reptile reveals surprising similarities between networks that control motor rhythms and those controlling sleep Sleep is one of the most mysterious, yet ubiquitous components of our biology. It has been described in all major groups of animals, including worms, jellyfish, insects or cephalopods, and in all vertebrates, from fish to humans.

A team of biologists from the University of Münster has investigated whether and how the immune system can influence the behaviour of sticklebacks It's a well-known fact that if you don't get enough sleep, you're more likely to get sick. And it has also been observed that people sleep differently when they're infected.

Researchers from Bonn uncover how tiny eye movements and the density of our photoreceptors aid in sharp vision Our ability to see starts with the light-sensitive photoreceptor cells in our eyes. A specific region of the retina, termed fovea, is responsible for sharp vision. Here, the color-sensitive cone photoreceptors allow us to detect even the smallest details.

The mid-embryonic developmental stages are strikingly similar in animals, plants and algae Recent observations in brown algae from researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biology Tübingen and the University of Dundee reveal the same hourglass pattern during embryogenesis as animals and plants. The -hourglass modelof development in multicellular organisms suggests that embryos of the same phylum display differences morphologically and molecularly at the earliest and latest stages but resemble one another at the mid-embryonic period.

One way the -male hormonetestosterone works is by binding to the androgen receptor. Researchers at the Technical University Munich and the Max Planck Institute for Biological Intelligence have succeeded in breeding chickens without the androgen receptor for the first time. This allowed them to study how androgen signaling affects development and appearance: animals of both sexes are infertile.

New imaging data reveal that the follicle expands, contracts, and finally releases the egg Approximately 400 times in a woman's life, a mature egg makes the -leap. It is released into the fallopian tube, ready for fertilization by the sperm. Researchers led by Melina Schuh, Christopher Thomas, and Tabea Lilian Marx from the Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences have now succeeded in visualizing the entire process of ovulation in mouse follicles in real-time.

An international team of researchers has reconstructed the structure of the brain of a fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) for the first time. The scientists from the FlyWire consortium - including biologist Dr. Katharina Eichler from the University of Leipzig - created a so-called connectome, a circuit diagram of the insect's brain.

First mRNA stabilizing substance could open new ways in the development of innovative mRNA therapeutics   mRNA-based therapeutics and vaccines are the new hope in the fight against incurable diseases. A commonly used strategy in the development of messenger RNA ( mRNA) medicine is based on the destruction of disease-causing mRNA.

Spatial proteomics provides therapeutic approach for patients with toxic epidermal necrolysis A global team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry has made a groundbreaking discovery that saves the lives of patients suffering from toxic epidermal necrolysis. This rare but often fatal reaction to common medications causes widespread detachment of the skin.

Scientists discover worms and snails in cavities and caves around hydrothermal vents Scientists discovered significant numbers of animals living in cavities and caves below the deep-sea seafloor, some growing up to half a meter of length. The discovery, which underlines how many secrets still hide in the inaccessible deep sea and how important it is to protect this ecosystem, was aided by the support of data scientists André Luiz de Oliveira from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology.

Current findings from a Jena-Zurich research project form an important basis for the creation of artificial symbioses with specific properties that could be used for biotechnological applications in the future. For example, they could be used in Medicine, agriculture or environmental technology to protect plants against illnesses or to modify fungi so that they produce certain enzymes or active pharmaceutical ingredients.

MINFLUX microscopy allows the determination of distances within biomolecules using an optical microscope A team led by physicists Steffen Sahl and Stefan Hell at the Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences in Göttingen and the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg has succeeded in measuring distances within biomolecules using a light microscope, down to one nanometer and with Éngström precision.

Plants can extract even the smallest traces of the important nutrient potassium from the soil. A team led by Würzburg biophysicist Rainer Hedrich describes how they achieve this in 'Nature Communications'. Potassium is one of the nutrients that plants need in large quantities. However, the amount of potassium in the soil can vary greatly: potassium-poor soils can contain up to a thousand times less of this nutrient than potassium-rich soils.

Researchers are breeding protein-rich rice varieties that cause minimal increase in blood sugar levels Rice is a staple food for over four billion people. By nature, it contains a lot of carbohydrates but very little protein. A team of researchers from the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines and the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology in Potsdam, Germany, has now identified the genes that control the carbohydrate composition and protein content of rice.

Researchers from Bonn and Aachen elucidate the role of individual brain neurons in human odor perception We often only realize how important our sense of smell is when it is no longer there: food hardly tastes good, or we no longer react to dangers such as the smell of smoke. Researchers at the University Hospital Bonn (UKB), the University of Bonn and the University of Aachen have investigated the neuronal mechanisms of human odor perception for the first time.

Thanks to these results, researchers now better understand how α-latrotoxin works. "The toxin mimics the function of the calcium channels of the presynaptic membrane in a highly complex way," explains Christos Gatsogiannis.

A new study reveals groundbreaking findings on visual navigation in the brain of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster An international research team from Freie Universität Berlin and the University of California Santa Barbara has conducted the first systematic analysis of all synaptic connections in the brain of an adult animal in a groundbreaking study.

Genome instability can cause numerous diseases. Cells have effective DNA repair mechanisms at their disposal. A research team at the University of Würzburg has now gained new insights into the DNA damage response. Whenever cells divide, there is a high risk of damage to the genetic material. After all, the cell has to duplicate its entire genetic material and copy billions of genetic letters before it divides.

On the early Earth, the atmosphere did not yet contain oxygen; nevertheless, the iron dissolved in the oceans was oxidized in gigantic quantities and deposited as rock, for example as banded iron ore in South Africa. Various bacteria excrete insoluble iron via their own metabolic reactions: Some, the phototrophic iron oxidizers, gain energy by oxidizing the iron with the help of sunlight, and others by converting the iron with nitrate as an oxidizing agent.