National Academy of Sciences | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Journal Club

Highlighting recently published papers selected by Academy members

Journal Club: Amoeba have long-distance preference for certain bacteria, pointing to other cell-sensing insights

Posted on January 29, 2019 by Jessica P. Johnson

How does the microscopic amoeba track down prey in the vastness of the forest floor? Ample research on the soil amoeba Dicytostelium discoideum, affectionately called “Dicty” by researchers, has provided some clues. But the mechanisms behind long-distance sensing of bacterial … Continue reading →

Journal Club: The simple physics of stretching rubber bands surprises researchers, offers up potential application

Posted on January 18, 2019 by Marcus Woo

Movie 2 – Classic strech dominated recoil When the researchers turned their high-speed camera on a rubber band being released, they discovered, to their surprise, that the shape of the back of the rubber band was round (top clip), and … Continue reading →

Categories: Applied Physical Sciences | Journal Club | Physics | Tagged fluid dynamics, molecular device, physics, rubber band, satellite, trapezoid | Leave a comment

Journal Club: Newly solved structure of a GABA receptor could offer drug design insights

Posted on January 14, 2019 by Jessica P. Johnson

Neurons message each other with the help of excitatory or inhibitory neurotransmitters. But to actually deliver those messages, the neurotransmitters must dock with protein receptors embedded in the cell membranes of adjacent neurons. Of particular interest in the human brain … Continue reading →

Categories: Journal Club | Neuroscience | Pharmacology | Tagged cryo-EM, depression, epilepsy, GABA receptor, ligand, neurotransmitter, X-ray crystallography | Leave a comment

Journal Club: Ion channel puts the squeeze on blood vessels, affecting blood pressure

Posted on December 15, 2018 by Charlotte Schubert

Blood pressure is exquisitely regulated to respond to our physiological state. Stress raises blood pressure. Simply stand up, and the arteries constrict to maintain pressure. New findings in mice show how a protein called PKD2 helps regulate blood pressure by … Continue reading →

Journal Club: Single gene mutation may boost recombination and help produce better crops

Posted on December 7, 2018 by Jessica P. Johnson

As climate change and population growth threaten to destabilize global food security, plant breeders are ramping up efforts to create better, more productive crops. But in order to introduce new traits, breeding techniques typically rely on rare genetic recombination events … Continue reading →

Journal Club: Model helps explain how social networks form

Posted on November 27, 2018 by Marcus Woo

One person might befriend another because of a shared love of basket weaving. Or, a friendship may instead blossom because that new friend has divergent interests, and can teach the other new hobbies. These opposing factors—seeking similarities and differences in … Continue reading →

Journal Club: Key protein family helps govern sense of touch in both plants and animals

Posted on November 16, 2018 by Amber Dance

Compared to their knowledge of other senses, scientists know relatively little about how cells sense touch. A newly confirmed family of mechanosensors, comprising more than a dozen members and present in both plants and animals, is an important step toward … Continue reading →

Categories: Cell Biology | Journal Club | Neuroscience | Tagged cell membrane, cell wall, ion channel, mechanosensor, OSCA protein, sense of touch, TMEM63 protein | Leave a comment

Journal Club: Researchers catch the mouse brain in the act of learning something new

Posted on November 5, 2018 by Amber Dance

Neurobiologists have captured, for the first time, the moment in a mouse’s brain when it first learns something new: in this case, that a beep signals a delicious droplet of sugar water. The results, recently reported in Nature Neuroscience, support a famous … Continue reading →

Journal Club: Simple model reproduces patterns of toxic protein buildup across multiple neurodegenerative diseases

Posted on October 26, 2018 by Jessica P. Johnson

Fatal neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) begin as tiny pockets of misfolded proteins that evade the body’s normal detritus-removal systems. They spread throughout the brain and clog neural pathways. But exactly how these proteins propagate … Continue reading →

Journal Club: Being less infectious pays off for lung pathogen

Posted on October 21, 2018 by Jyoti Madhusoodanan

The human body is home to millions of commensal microbes, some of which—given the right circumstances—can cause disease. One such microbe, known as nontypeable Haemophilus influenzae (NTHi), infects the lungs of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a condition that … Continue reading →