In a first, a patient in New Zealand has undergone gene-editing to lower their cholesterol. If it works, it could signal the start of an era in which nearly everyone might undergo a gene-edit in order to prevent disease.
Category: genetics – Page 288
The LightCycler® 480 real-time PCR system: a versatile platform for genetic variation research
Circa 2008
From endpoint fluorescence to melting curve analysis.
Today’s research on somatic, genetic and epigenetic variation in eukaryotic cells requires fast, accurate and cost-effective methods for screening large numbers of samples or loci in parallel. Variations identified by genomic sequencing or array studies need to be subsequently confirmed and validated.
Real-time PCR has become a well established technology for this purpose. The plate-based LightCycler 480 system offers a broad selection of methods and applications (Fig. 1).
Dr Dana Merriman, PhD — UW-Oshkosh — Hibernation Biology & Applications In Human Health & Resilience
Hibernation Biology & Applications In Human Health & Resilience — Dr. Dana K. Merriman, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor Emerita of Biology; Director of the Squirrel Colony, UW-Oshkosh.
Dr. Dana K. Merriman Ph.D. (www.uwosh.edu/facstaff/merriman/VaughanHome), is Distinguished Professor Emerita of Biology, and Director of the Squirrel Colony, at University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, and Adjunct Professor of Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences, Medical College of Wisconsin.
With her BA in Biological Science and her PhD in Physiology and Cell Biology, both from University of California-Santa Barbara, as well as having spent time as a Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Utah Health Sciences Center, a core focus of Dr. Merriman’s laboratory research over the years has been the development of a captive breeding colony of the 13-lined ground squirrels.
This unique, one-of-a-kind captive breeding program, due to this species very unique cone-dominant, diurnal visual system, as well as their impressive physiological ability to survive in hibernation for over six months without food or water, has served investigators with animals and custom-dissected tissues from the US, Asia, and Europe for decades, as well as been core to Dr Merriman’s own work on vision, including cone cell biology and retinal function during the metabolic state transitions associated with hibernation.
Over the years, Dr. Merriman expanded her research horizon well outside of vision, into neuroscience, and in recent years she has collaborated on studies of muscle physiology, viral genomics, molecular biology of transposable elements, and comparative genetics of the control of coat patterning.
Scientists Have Sequenced the DNA of a 2000-Year-Old Human From Pompeii
Research that was recently published in Scientific Reports presents the first human genome that has been successfully sequenced from a person who passed away in Pompeii, Italy, after Mount Vesuvius’ explosion in the year 79 CE. Only little segments of mitochondrial DNA
DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is a molecule composed of two long strands of nucleotides that coil around each other to form a double helix. It is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms that carries genetic instructions for development, functioning, growth, and reproduction. Nearly every cell in a person’s body has the same DNA. Most DNA is located in the cell nucleus (where it is called nuclear DNA), but a small amount of DNA can also be found in the mitochondria (where it is called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA).
Cognitum S2 Episode 6 // Epigenetic Rejuvenation
Things I learned:
1. Various tissues will have different safe zones of rejuvenation before they become pluripotent but we could make tissue specific treatments and treat them separately without effecting others.
2. A 40 year old woman makes a 40 year old egg but that egg is rejuvenated to its younger state with no damage after fertilization.
CRISPR cattle cleared for the first time
Beef cattle genetically altered to be less susceptible to heat stress have been cleared for human consumption by the FDA.
Genetically modified pig hearts transplanted into two more patients
The team of researchers who transplanted a genetically modified pig’s heart into a living human earlier this year have completed two more pig heart transplant surgeries, setting the protocol for such operations.
In January this year, 57-year-old David Bennett became the first man on the planet to receive a heart from a genetically modified pig. Before this, researchers transplanted kidneys from similarly modified pigs into patients that were brain dead.
The organs are sourced from a company called Revivicor which uses genetic engineering to remove specific genes in the pigs to help in reducing transplant rejection while adding some that make the organs more compatible with the human immune system.