Era of personalised medicine awaits Apr 9, 2009
These are arranged in a double helix, whose elegant structure was first described by Crick and Watson in 1953. At the time, their discovery barely made headlines. (BBC News -- Science)
Chemists Create Bipedal, Autonomous DNA Walker Apr 6, 2009
In nature, single strands of DNA each containing four molecules, or bases, attached to backbone self-assemble to form a double helix when their bases match up. Kinesin is a molecular motor that carries various cargoes from one place in the cell to another. (Science Daily)
Discovery May Result In New Test To Determine Predisposition To Cancer Mar 26, 2009
The assay determines the efficiency of the repair mechanism when DNA suffers a double-strand break, when both strands in the double helix are severed. These breaks cause genetic instability and are particularly dangerous because they can lead to genome rearrangements or deletions of certain genes that, when gone, result in cancer. (Science Daily)
DNA Shape Is Constrained By Evolution: Structural Approach To Exploring DNA Mar 20, 2009
Genomic DNA is shown streaming out from a chromosome (left), progressively unfolding as chromatin, the 30-nm filament, nucleosomes, the DNA double helix, and finally the letters representing the nucleotide sequence. Although it is the molecular topography of the DNA helix that is recognized by proteins, current methods of genome analysis mostly focus on the order of nucleotides. (Science Daily)
Fishing For Microdeletions That Predispose An Embryo To Develop Cancer Syndromes In Later Life Mar 19, 2009
The strands of DNA that twist together to form the double helix structure are made up of lots of small sections called nucleotides. The nucleotides are made up of the four DNA bases adenine, thymine, guanine and cytosine (or A,T,C,G). (Science Daily)
Scripps opens new home in Jupiter Feb 27, 2009
The spire shaped like a DNA double helix atop one of the three buildings symbolized not just the promise of new scientific breakthroughs, but also hope for a sorely needed boost to Florida s ailing economy. In 2003, just after the real estate boom had begun, former Gov. Jeb Bush announced that La Jolla, Calif. (South Florida Business Journal, FL)
How to hang a cat by its DNA tale Feb 26, 2009
A kind of modern-day portrait with a double helix twist. Set in orange and red tones, the portrait looks like an abstract work of art to the untrained eye. (The Age, Australia -- National)
Alien life 'may exist among us' Feb 18, 2009
" The molecule is essentially a modified version of our own DNA double helix - but with six "letters" in its genetic alphabet, instead of four. These nucleotides pair up in strands, which can replicate, though only with the help of polymerase enzymes and heat. "Sometimes mistakes are made in pairing and these mistakes are maintained in the next generation - it is evolving," said Prof Brenner. "The next step is to apply natural selection to it, to see if it can evolve under selective pressure.... (BBC News -- Science)
Form Follows Sequence Feb 7, 2009
Ever since James Watson and Francis Crick solved the double helix structure of dna in 1953, biology's most formidable structural challenge has been the "protein folding problem" - learning how nature gets from a gene, a length of dna that encodes the order of amino-acid residues in a string, to a working protein, that same string intricately folded into all the pockets and creases and knobs essential to the physics and chemistry of life. While protein structures are being collected at a steadily... (FirstScience.com)
Foundation 9 Entertainment Announces New Name and Logo for Southern California Studio Mar 28, 2008
Double Helix was formed from the merger of The Collective and Shiny ... March 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Foundation 9 Entertainment announced today that it has selected the name, Double Helix, for its Irvine, California studio ... The formation of Double Helix has combined the existing studios' proprietary technologies, production best practices and talented teams into a single entity that is now able to build upon its previous experience to gain new heights in quality and efficiency. (Yahoo! Wire -- Entertainment News)
Will Whole Genome Research Result In Genetic Profiling? Mar 26, 2008
1, 2007) Nobel laureate James Watson -- co-discoverer of the DNA double helix and father of the Human Genome Project -- became the first human to receive the data that encompass his personal genome. (Feb. (Science Daily)
After cancer, alife resculpted Mar 24, 2008
Im sorry, I whisper into his wilted cotton shirt as though Id spun my own defective double helix. No, dont apologize, Steven says to me gently. (MSNBC -- Health)
DNA-Guided Nanoparticle Assembly Mar 19, 2008
" The first type of DNA forms a double helix, while the second type is non-complementary, neutral DNA, so it provides a repulsive force. The addition of the repulsive force allows for regulating the size of particle clusters and the speed of self-assembly with more precision.". In subsequent experiments, the researchers used DNA to guide the creation of three-dimensional, ordered, crystalline structures of nanoparticles. (Science Daily)
CSIRO Double Helix Science Club Mar 18, 2008
The email can be received as part of a Double Helix Science Club membership or can be subscribed to separately at no cost. The Double Helix Science Club ... Member of the Double Helix Science Club receive a Scientriffic or The Helix magazine every two months, a weekly Science by Email, notification of member events that are held at the nine CSIRO Science Education Centres throughout the year, discounts off purchases from the CSIRO shop and also discounts for entrance to the Parkes Radio... (Suite101.com)
First Draft Of Corn Genome Completed Feb 28, 2008
5 billion base pairs that make up the double helix of corn DNA. The corn genome also has long lines of repetitive code. And corn has 50,000 to 60,000 genes to identify and characterize. (Science Daily)
Project maps first sketch of corn genome Feb 27, 2008
While it may sound simple, the double helix of corn DNA is made up of 2. 5 billion base pairs and about 50 percent of the genome consists of moving DNA that can change the function of genes. (Ames Daily Tribune, IA)
DNA study supports African origin of man Feb 23, 2008
This undated handout illustration shows the DNA double helix. Diving deep into the human gene. (Yahoo News)
New understanding of how big molecules bind will lead to better drugs, synthetic organic materials Feb 22, 2008
As well as being important for temporary binding, non-covalent bonding forces are also essential for maintaining the structure of large proteins, and for the DNA double helix, on a longer term basis, by holding the components together. This is a very complex subject given the huge number of combinations of components involved, and so a significant advance reported at the ESF Biosupramolecular conference by Andrei Lupas from the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology in Germany was of a... (EurekAlert!)
Are biometrics a cause deserving of concern? Feb 11, 2008
Then came DNA. In the 20th century, scientists learned to use the double helix nucleic acid molecule as a means of identification even more definitive than the fingerprint. And the FBI built a DNA database as well. (Montana Standard, MT)
Synthesized DNA Used To Create Materials Feb 4, 2008
The binding of the two single strands of linker DNA to each other completes the double helix, tightly binding the particles to each other. Each gold nanoparticle has multiple strands of DNA attached to its surface so the nanoparticle is binding in many directions, resulting in a three-dimensional structure -- a crystal. (Science Daily)
Are double helix DNA molecules telepathic? Jan 29, 2008
Are double helix DNA molecules telepathic ... Are double helix DNA molecules telepathic ... Revealing what could be considered a telepathic sense, double helixes of DNA can recognize matching molecules from a distance and then gather together, all seemingly without help from any other molecules, scientists find. (Xinhuanet, China)
Scientist Creates Life — Almost Jan 28, 2008
Still, a half-century after the discovery of the double helix, nobody doubts that it is our DNA that determines what we are in the same way that lines of code determine software or the digital etchings on a CD determine the music you hear. Etch new signals, and you write a new song. (Time.com)
DNA molecules display telepathy-like quality Jan 25, 2008
Double helixes of DNA can recognize matching molecules from a distance ... Double helixes of DNA can recognize matching molecules from a distance and then gather together, all seemingly without help from any other molecules, scientists find ... Previously, under the classic understanding of DNA, scientists had no reason to suspect that double helixes of the molecule could sort themselves by type, let alone seek each other out. (MSNBC -- Technology)
Newsweek: Scientists push past the boundaries of life Jan 25, 2008
Ever since James Watson and Francis Crick discovered the DNA double helix in 1953, molecular biologists have found it useful to imagine genes as software controlling hardware (the cell itself). But SynBio practitioners take the comparison to a new level: they are creating new hardware and software where none existed. (MSNBC -- Technology)
Explore The Secret of How Life Works at The Health Museum Jan 23, 2008
-- Giant Double Helix -- An eight-foot-tall, 25-foot-long display of DNA's double helix structure -- Hereditary Slot Machines -- A working slot machine that demonstrates the odds that children will inherit genes for certain characteristics -- The Cookie Factory -- A visualization of protein production that children and adults alike can grasp, with DNA, genes and proteins as the ingredients and recipes for "making" human beings -- Cell Explorer -- Slide a video monitor target over the parts of a... (Yahoo! Wire -- Entertainment News)
A sense of place Jan 21, 2008
The dominant architectural feature is a 134-foot-tall DNA double helix, which serves as a spire, similar to how church would display a cross. That distinct spire was the joint brainchild of Eb Zeidler, the co-architect, and Palm Beach resident Alexander Dreyfoos, a Scripps trustee. (South Florida Business Journal, FL)
Between two worlds Jan 19, 2008
But he says he is still awed by the DNA double helix and "the sheer beautiful logic of the periodic table and the exceptions to its logic. That sense of structure determining behaviour was what I hoped to find in science and eventually did find in writing. What is called the creative process is for me often a matter of extrapolating from 'this' to 'that'. If you follow the logic of an idea in that way you can end up in some very strange places.". This approach led his early stories to be... (Guardian Unlimited -- Arts)
Father of Breakthrough Cancer Therapy Dies Jan 16, 2008
Judah Folkman, "the father of antiangiogenesis," a way to starve tumors of blood, died yesterday from an apparent heart attack. " At the time, Folkman's antiangiogenic therapies had successfully shrunk enormous mouse tumors comparable two-pound (0.9-kilogram) masses in humans. And, almost overnight, angiogenesis inhibitors became the cancer therapy du jour. "At the beginning I felt enormous pressure," Folkman said in with Scientific American. "[The news] raised expectations and demand for... (Scientific American)
Epigenetics: New Discoveries About The Protein That Oversees DNA Replication Jan 14, 2008
The DNA double helix (diameter 2 nanometers) is wrapped around histones, proteins that facilitate its compaction, to form nucleosomes, which are strung along the DNA like beads on a string. This bead necklace then folds on itself to form a fiber chromatin. (Science Daily)
A dream about Asia that won't go away Jan 11, 2008
With one difference: they manage to extract the ultra-nationalist gene from his double helix that so aggravated Japan's neighbors, leaving intact this otherwise political houdini. The current PM, Yasuo Fukuda, is doing much better on the regional-relations front, but otherwise, alas, he is no Koizumi. (Jakarta Post, Indonesia -- Editorial)
Tiny RNA Molecules Control Breast Cancer's Spread Jan 10, 2008
DNA is made up two strands (a double helix) of "letters" that contain all the information needed to create cells. RNAs are single-stranded copies of segments of the DNA, Tavazoie explained. (Health-Finder)
Nerdcraft: Geeks gone wild Dec 28, 2007
"I made some worms and snakes, got bored of that, and then began to think of what else I could make with a twisted tube. "One evening it dawned on me: Two twisted tubes with joins in between makes a double helix," she wrote in an e-mail. The finished result was so popular, she posted the pattern on her personal website to encourage people to make their own instead of asking her to make more. Projects inspired by science and technology are a natural fit for crafters who love to experiment, says... (Globe and Mail)
Helix railroad Dec 20, 2007
Paul Brown watches as a trolley car races up a rare double helix train layout, reaches the top and then zips down to the bottom while the click and clack echoes in the room. The double helix looks something like an immensely long ladder twisted into a helix, or coil ... Brown s father-in-law, Bert Adair, found out about the helices during a train show in Pennsylvania and later purchased two single helices layouts and one double helix layout. (McKinney Courier-Gazette, TX)
Elasticity Of Short DNA Molecules: In Theory And Experiment Dec 10, 2007
16, 2007) Researchers at Duke University's Pratt School of Engineering have uncovered a missing link in scientists' understanding of the physical forces that give DNA its famous double helix. (Dec. (Science Daily)
Arab world opens door to Western classics Dec 10, 2007
It's been 375 years since Galileo published his earth-shaking Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, 336 since John Milton wrote Paradise Regained and nearly 40 since James D. Watson had an apparent international bestseller with The Double Helix, about the discovery of the structure of DNA. Amazingly, however, none of these books, and thousands of classics like them, has ever been translated into Arabic, the first tongue of more than 300 hundred million persons worldwide. Indeed,... (Globe and Mail -- Entertainment)
Apple Store opening, 14th Street, New York Dec 9, 2007
The double helix, Apple style. The now-mandatory glass spiral staircase was impressive at two stories, but nothing out of the ordinary in Apple Store terms. (Ars Technica)
X games for scientists offers $10m top prize Dec 4, 2007
Last spring, private labs for the first time sequenced the genomes of two individuals: Nobel laureate Thomas Watson, codiscoverer of the DNA double helix, and J. Craig Venter, the founder who is an adviser for the Archon X Prize advisory panel. But the process remains long and expensive. (Boston Globe)
50 years on: The Keeling Curve legacy Dec 2, 2007
It is a scientific icon, which belongs, some claim, alongside E=mc2 and the double helix. Its name - the Keeling Curve - may be scarcely known outside scientific circles, but the jagged upward slope showing rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere has become one of the most famous graphs in science, and a potent symbol of our times. (BBC News -- Science)
Aesthetic engineering Dec 1, 2007
In "The Sensual Bouquet of DNA," for example, one can find a spiral reminiscent of the standard double helix, but these genetic strands give way to floral blooms and zig-zagging stems. Her interest in science comes from her life-long curiosity about how things work. (The Scientist)
Review: 'Avoid Boring People' Nov 24, 2007
" Through his irreverent eyes, real science sounded so much more appealing than the shrink-wrapped variety I'd been offered in school. And writing about science sounded even better. Today in Culture Watson has managed to do both. With its novelistic touch, "The Double Helix" captured the drama of the laboratory: Crick with the "shattering bang" of his laughter driving everyone up the wall as he and Watson raced to beat Linus Pauling; Rosalind Franklin working quietly in her corner, withering the... (International Herald Tribune -- Arts)
New Scenario For First Life On Earth Nov 23, 2007
"We found that even tiny fragments of double helix DNA can spontaneously self-assemble into columns that contain many molecules," Clark said ... Matching, or complementary base sequences enable the chains to pair up and form the widely recognized double helix structure. (Science Daily)
Controversial comments taint Watson's legacy Nov 21, 2007
Becomes director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory; writes The Double Helix ... James Watson is considered one the greatest scientists of the 20th century for his work on discovery of the DNA double helix. (USA Today -- Tech)
Young inventors think outside the bubble Nov 20, 2007
Manoah Burden, 11, of Akron, Ohio: "DNA Model" - A three-dimensional model of a DNA double helix. Grace Abernathy, 13, of Noblesville, Ind. (AZCentral -- News)
Young's Experiment Performed In A Hydrogen Molecule Nov 18, 2007
This is the fundamental basis of the experimental techniques such as X ray diffraction, thanks to which the DNA double helix structure was discovered. Ricardo D;ez explains, The Laws that predict, for example, the trajectory of a car at a certain speed are not those that govern the behaviour of atomic-sized particles. (Science Daily)
Child diabetes: New gene clues unveiled as UN marks World Diabetes Day Nov 15, 2007
This undated handout illustration shows the DNA double helix. Scientists on Wednesday said they. (Yahoo News -- Top Stories)
Toronto love-in for a Brazilian trickster Nov 14, 2007
Now, nearly 40 years later and in his mid-60s, he's still exploring the realm of contradiction and clearly enjoys having an audience that will happily follow him through the strands of that double helix. On Sunday, at his Toronto debut (incredible, given his stature as one of the founders of contemporary Brazilian musical aesthetics, through the aforementioned Tropicalismo movement), a full house enthusiastically went wherever he took them, from old favourites to songs from his most recent... (Globe and Mail -- Entertainment)
Endless opportunities ahead Nov 12, 2007
GSK educator Katie Eilbert explained to a crowd of girls how they could learn by assembling the spiraling double helix from plastic pieces representing building blocks of DNA adenine, thymine, cytosine and guanine against a backbone of sugar and phosphate. Science is always new, and it's always changing, Eilbert told the youngsters. (San Diego Union-Tribune)
Sockeyes raise value of permits Nov 4, 2007
"The double helix of its DNA has some interesting properties in regard to light emission. Because of the way it is shaped, you can insert light-emitting molecules within it that operate more efficiently than in other host materials," Steckl said. Salmon sperm is the first material ever used for bio-LEDs. (Anchorage Daily News)
Controversial Nobel winner resigns Nov 1, 2007
"Jim's legacy will not only include CSHL and the double helix, but his pioneering efforts that led to the sequencing of the human genome and his innovations in science writing and education.". Watson had made controversial remarks in the past. (CNN -- Tech)
Art goes to street Oct 31, 2007
Bond, 41, used a 100-year-old image of Jesus on a board with a new commandment: "Thou shalt grind." But double helix design alludes to the actual title, Genetically Inclined to Grind. "It's kind of this perverse marriage of science and religion," he says. (AZCentral -- Entertainment)
How did chemical constituents essential to life arise on primitive Earth? Oct 31, 2007
Asteroids may have brought them from outer space, but how did biomolecules form there" The newly proposed mechanism for the formation of adenine gives a clear picture of how it could have become one of the building blocks essential for the formation of DNA. The research was published today in the print version of the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science. Schleyers coworkers were Ph. D. candidate Debjani Roy, the first author of the paper, and Katayoun Najafian, his former student... (EurekAlert!)
Arthur Kornberg Oct 29, 2007
Until Kornberg's discovery of the enzyme that "switches on" the DNA replication process - that is triggers the assembly of nature's chemical bases in the sequence needed to produce exact copies of the template revealed by the unwinding of the DNA double helix - the masterful proposal for the structure of genetic material put forward by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953 remained only a brilliant biochemical hypothesis ... Still missing, however, was a practical demonstration of the... (Guardian Unlimited -- Life)
Writing home about nothing Oct 29, 2007
The Double Helix by James WatsonThe adventure of science, and real people trying to win. The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard RhodesTells the story of atomic and nuclear physics in superb details and is extremely well written. (Guardian Unlimited -- Books)
James Watson Quits Post After Remarks on Races Oct 27, 2007
Dr. Watson is being honored for "The Double Helix," the book he wrote about the elucidation of DNA. Though he will still receive the prize, and the $5,000 it carries, "there were some members of the university community who had expressed reservations about Dr. Watson coming here to speak after the controversy over his remarks in the U.K.," Joseph Bonner, Rockefellers director of communications, said yesterday. Mr. Bonner said that just as Rockefellers president, Sir Paul M. Nurse, had decided... (New York Times)
Not so elementary, Dr. Watson Oct 27, 2007
He has been spewing misogynist venom for decades, since the publication in 1968 of "The Double Helix," in which he savages Rosalind Franklin - from whom many say Watson stole ideas that led to the Nobel he shared with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins for figuring out the structure of DNA.. Watson, who was just 34 when he was awarded the Nobel in 1962, seems to have chosen the microphone as an instrument of abuse. (Boston Globe)
Embattled scientist retires in wake of controversy Oct 26, 2007
They described the double helix structure of DNA, the molecules that contain all life forms' genetic blueprint. Henry Kelly, president of the Federation of American Scientists, praised Watson's role as leader of the genome project and for making the Cold Spring Harbor Lab a world-class institution. (Newsday -- Opinion)
Famed DNA Scientist Quits Post After Race Remarks Oct 26, 2007
Watson shared the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Francis Crick and Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins for the description of the double helix structure of DNA. He had been associated with the laboratory since 1948. In the aftermath of the published remarks, Watson told an audience in London: "To all those who have drawn the inference from my words that Africa, as a continent, is somehow genetically inferior, I can only apologize unreservedly.". (Newsmax)
The north-south double helix Oct 25, 2007
This subject needs a 3D model like the double helix, which would better show things as they really are. . (Guardian Unlimited)
Donovan's troupe lets go kinetically Oct 22, 2007
She is like a double helix in motion, constantly flipping perspective. She seems to reach out and coil inward at the same time, her body twisting and spiraling, arms curving forward and back with quick shifts of dynamics. (Boston Globe -- Living)
Race, hate and DNA Oct 21, 2007
" Watson was determined to unlock that information. After studying at the universities of Chicago (his home town), Indiana and Copenhagen, he moved to Cambridge University where he met fellow scientist Francis Crick. The men studied the structure of DNA, in fierce competition with other scientists, and were the first to discover the delicately curved double helix structure which is now such a well-known image. Together with New Zealand-born molecular biologist Maurice Wilkins, they won their... (The Age, Australia -- Breaking News)
Nobel Winner Apologizes For Race Remarks Oct 20, 2007
DNA discoverer James Watson poses for photographers behind a model of the DNA double helix at an exhibition in Berlin in October 2004. (AP). (CBS News)
Scientist suspended over race comments Oct 20, 2007
DNA discoverer James Watson, seen here in 2004 with DNA Double Helix model, has had a London speech canceled after remarks about race ... Watson shared the 1962 Nobel prize for medicine with Francis Crick and Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins for their description of the double helix structure of DNA.. (MSNBC -- Race)
James Watson: Genetic disorder Oct 20, 2007
The discovery that the DNA molecule is shaped like a gently twisted ladder, a double helix that can unzip to make copies of itself to transmit life's hereditary information, owed a lot to the work of another scientist, Rosalind Franklin ... Worse still, in his book The Double Helix, a gossipy account of the cracking of the code, Watson made derogatory remarks about her physical appearance, and painted her as a frigid, badly dressed and charmless bluestocking ... The Double Helix changed the way... (Independent)
Watson rues race row, suspended Oct 20, 2007
Watson, who won a Nobel Prize in 1962 for his description of the double helix structure of DNA, was suspended as chancellor of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York on Thursday. He has been associated with the lab since 1948 but it joined a throng of other institutions and prominent researchers that said Watsons comments were offensive and scientifically incorrect. (India Times, India)
Comments about blacks by Nobel laureate scientist James Watson condemned as racist Oct 19, 2007
Scientist James Watson, behind a model of the DNA double helix, is under fire for comments he made suggesting that blacks are intellectually inferior to whites. (FILE/ASSOCIATED PRESS). (Boston Globe)
