Plant poisoning is a significant problem around the world. In the United States, exposures to plant toxins account for approximately ten percent of the annual calls to the nation's Poison Control Centers. Responding to the need for a useful guide to the harmful potential of plants, Handbook of Poisonous and Injurious Plants provides portable, comprehensive information to the toxic plants encountered everywhere, both inside and outside the home.

Every time a cell repairs or replicates its DNA, the resulting single strand is wrapped up by a dedicated protein complex. In eukaryotes or organisms whose cells have a nucleus, this job is handled by a tripartite complex called replication protein A (RPA). Researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have now unearthed a novel RPA-like complex that specifically homes in on the short single-stranded DNA "tail" end of yeast chromosomes.

Nanofilter array: 4" wafer with 160 membranes. A newly designed porous membrane, so thin it's invisible edge-on, may revolutionize the way doctors and scientists manipulate objects as small as a molecule.

The most important genes associated with a risk of developing type-2 diabetes have been identified, scientists report today in a new study.

Just as homes have smoke detectors, cells have an enzyme that responds to a buildup of fatty acids by triggering the production of a key molecule in the biochemical pathway that breaks down these fatty acids, according to investigators at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. This breakdown of fatty acids, in turn, provides the cell energy while reducing the chance that excess fatty acids will accumulate.

In a finding that could have profound implications for AIDS vaccine design, researchers led by a team at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), have generated an atomic-level picture of a key portion of an HIV surface protein as it looks when bound to an infection-fighting antibody. Unlike much of the constantly mutating virus, this protein component is stable and—more importantly, say the researchers—appears vulnerable to attack from this specific antibody, known as b12, that can broadly neutralize HIV.

When a virus infects a person, it triggers a series of biochemical reactions in immune-system cells that literally may have life or death consequences.

Plants have an immune system that resists infection, yet 10% of the world's agricultural production is lost annually to diseases caused by bacteria, fungi, and viruses. Understanding how disease resistance works may help combat this scourge.

The Scripps Research team, led by neuroscientists Manuel Sanchez-Alavez and Tamas Bartfai, discovered that mice genetically altered to lack a molecule known as the EP3 receptor tend to be more active during their normal sleep cycle and to eat more. In the study, this led to weight increases of up to 30 percent relative to mice with the receptors.

Researchers have found evidence that chimpanzees from West Africa were cracking nuts with stone tools before the advent of agriculture, thousands of years ago. The result suggests chimpanzees developed this behaviour on their own, or even that stone tool use was a trait inherited from our common ancestor. Julio Mercader, Christophe Boesch and colleagues found the stones at the Noulo site in Cote d'Ivoire, the only known prehistoric chimpanzee settlement.

An artificial nose could be a real benefit at times: this kind of biosensor could sniff out poisons, explosives or drugs, for instance. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research and the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry recently revealed a technique for integrating membrane proteins into artificial structures. Membrane proteins have several important functions in the cell, one of which is to act as receptors, passing on signals from molecules in the air, for example, to the cell interior.