An Arizona State University team has used a unique high-throughput screening system to complete the largest-ever analysis of microRNAs (miRNA), the puzzling little cousins of RNA that help regulate gene expression.
Their findings offer a new explanation for why groups of similar miRNA sequences, called miRNA families, are so plentiful in higher species of animals, including humans.
Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
ASU Completes Largest-Ever microRNA Study
The book The Runner’s Brain told runners how their minds could change their running. Now a University of Arizona study says the reverse might be true as well.
Using functional connectivity MRI (fcMRI), they found significant differences in areas that are active when the brain is at rest. Possibly, such networks could play a key role in the effects of aging and neurodegenerative diseases.
Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
Arizona Study: Brains Of Young Adult Runners Differ From Those Of Healthy Peers
Work in the Chilean desert by Arizona State University scientists has reopened debate regarding the biological origins of Martian silica fragments found in 2007 — and strengthened the case for life on Mars billions of years ago.
NASA’s Spirit rover churned up the opaline silica deposits as it explored the Columbia Hills area of Mars’s Gusev Crater.
Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
Silica Nodules In Chile Argue For Ancient Life On Mars
For 11 years, volunteer citizen scientists have gathered near Seligman, Arizona, to help spot, capture and release endangered black-footed ferrets. The outing is part of a program to monitor captive-bred ferrets that wildlife specialists began reintroducing to Aubrey Valley 20 years ago.
This year, I joined them.
Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
Citizen Scientists Make Arizona Game And Fish Black-Footed Ferrets Project Possible
Barrow Neurological Institute is working with IBM’s Jeopardy-winning supercomputer, Watson, to identify treatment targets for Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.
ALS is a poorly understood neuromuscular disease with only limited treatment options. Its capacity to strike anyone, at any time, seemingly without pattern, has puzzled researchers.
Read/listen to my full story at KJZZ’s Arizona Science Desk:
BM’s Watson Computer Helps Barrow Identify New ALS Genes