Genomatix is a company with a renowned track record in the analysis of genomic data generated by high throughput technologies. Genomatix algorithms include optimized fast mapping strategies and Genomatix already provides the most complete genome annotation in terms of transcriptome and promoters available in its ElDorado database surpassing alternative databases in this specific content by a factor of 2 to 4.

University of Adelaide geneticist Dr Jozef Gecz and a team of Belgium and UK scientists have achieved a major breakthrough in discovering the causes of intellectual disability.

Researchers have identified a potential new mechanism through which human T-lymphotropic virus type-1 (HTLV-1) causes leukemia in adults. The findings, published this week in the online open access journal Retrovirology, represent the first time that a reduction in histone protein levels has been linked to viral infection and the development of cancer.

Recent outbreaks of norovirus–also known as stomach flu–indicate the highly contagious, fast-moving virus is again a public health concern. The Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) has six simple steps to protect families against noroviruses.

This illustration shows the structure of an endoglucanase enzyme. The arrows indicate straight beta-strands. You can also see the twisted alpha-helices. Peter Reilly's lab discovered the enzyme's structure by producing and crystallizing the enzyme, shooting X-rays through it and analyzing the resulting diffraction pattern. This particular enzyme breaks down cellulose by attacking bonds in the middle of sugar chains. Credit: Peter Reilly/Iowa State University Peter Reilly pointed to the framed journal covers decorating his office.

Eurasian reed warblers captured during their spring migrations and released after being flown 1,000 kilometers to the east can correct their travel routes and head for their original destinations, researchers report online on January 31st in Current Biology, a publication of Cell Press.

A floral shoot of the Orobanche mutelii parasite alongside the nonflowering shoot of its tobacco host. Three types of parasitic plants, each exhibiting a different degree to which it needs its host, are the subject of a three-year, $1.5 million study at Virginia Tech to catalog genes essential to parasitism. Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Plant Genome Program, the study examines hard-to-control weeds in the Orobanchaceae family that can wreak havoc on commodity and food crops, especially in developing countries in Africa and the Middle East.

Results published today in FASEB (the journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology) by researchers at Columbia University, including Jeremy Mao of the Columbia College of Dental Medicine, demonstrate a novel way of using porous structures as a drug-delivery vehicle that can help boost the integration of host tissue with surgically implanted titanium.

Twenty-one boxes filled with 7,000 unique seed samples from more than 36 African nations were shipped to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a facility being built on a remote island in the Arctic Circle as a repository of last resort for humanity’s agricultural heritage.

In an achievement some see as the "holy grail" of nanoscience, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have for the first time used DNA to guide the creation of three-dimensional, ordered, crystalline structures of nanoparticles (particles with dimensions measured in billionths of a meter). The ability to engineer such 3-D structures is essential to producing functional materials that take advantage of the unique properties that may exist at the nanoscale - for example, enhanced magnetism, improved catalytic activity, or new optical properties. The research will be published in the January 31, 2008, issue of the journal Nature.

The effects of infestation are dramatic. On the left, a nearly completely devastated New Zealand parsnip. On the right, an unaffected plant. What could be lower than the lowly parsnip, a root once prized for its portable starchiness but which was long ago displaced by the more palatable potato? Perhaps only the parsnip webworm gets less respect. An age-old enemy of the parsnip, the webworm is one of very few insects able to overcome the plant’s chemical defenses. The tenacious parsnip webworm has followed the weedy version of the parsnip in its transit from its ancestral home in Eurasia to Europe, North America and – most recently – New Zealand.

The European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) and the Federation of European Biochemical Societies (FEBS) announced Naama Barkai of the Weizman Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel as the first-ever winner of the FEBS/EMBO Women in Science Award. Naama Barkai receives the 2008 award for her outstanding contributions to the field of systems biology and the mathematical modelling of biological systems.

Aggression, testosterone and nepotism don’t necessarily help one climb the social ladder, but the support of a good female can, according to new research on the social habits of an unusual African species of fish.

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery, which is used to treat Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders, is now being studied for its potential to treat a variety of conditions. For example, DBS of the hypothalamus has been used to treat cluster headaches and aggressiveness in humans, and stimulating this area influences feeding behavior in animals. A new study found that hypothalamic DBS performed in the treatment of a patient with morbid obesity unexpectedly evoked detailed autobiographical memories. The study will be published online in the Annals of Neurology (http://www.interscience.wiley.com/journal/ana), the official journal of the American Neurological Association.

A vaccine against the most common and deadliest strain of avian flu, H5N1, has been engineered and tested by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Vaccine Research and Novavax Inc. According to a study published by the Public Library of Science in the Jan. 30 issue of PLoS ONE, the vaccine produced a strong immune response in mice and protected them from death following infection with the H5N1 virus. The vaccine is being tested in humans in an early-phase clinical trial.