45 years on: How serotonin makes schistosome parasites move

Schistosoma mansoni and its close relatives are parasitic flatworms that affect millions worldwide and kill an estimated 250,000 people a year. A study published on January 16 in PLOS Pathogens identifies a new part of the ...

Light-activated reversal of anesthesia

In a new study, a light-sensitive moiety has been added to propofol, a commonly used anesthetic, allowing its narcotic effect to be controlled by light. The compound also offers a possible route to the treatment of certain ...

Researchers find gene critical to sense of smell in fruit fly

(Medical Xpress) -- Fruit flies don't have noses, but a huge part of their brains is dedicated to processing smells. Flies probably rely on the sense of smell more than any other sense for essential activities such as finding ...

Controlling movements with light

German researchers at the Ruhr-Universitaet have succeeded in controlling the activity of certain nerve cells using light, thus influencing the movements of mice. By changing special receptors in nerve cells of the cerebellum ...

Molecular architecture of key NMDA receptor subunit revealed

Structural biologists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) in collaboration with colleagues at Emory University have determined the molecular structure of a key portion, or subunit, of a receptor type commonly expressed ...

page 2 from 3