The salamander is a superhero of regeneration, able to replace lost limbs, damaged lungs, sliced spinal cord -- even bits of lopped-off brain.

Scientists are to study a group of proteins that are highly effective at killing bacteria and which could hold the key to developing new types of antibiotics.

A good wine needs to ripen. But it's a long way to the barrel. Even before the harvest, the grapevines have to overcome all kinds of obstacles. Extremely hot or rainy periods can destroy entire crops, not to mention the wide variety of pests that can appear on the scene. Bugs such as the vine louse or the rust mite, fungi such as mildew, or viruses such as the "Grapevine fanleaf virus" (GFLV for short) can give the vines a hard time. The GFLV infects the grapevine and causes fanleaf disease, resulting in deformed and very yellowed leaves, smaller grapes and crop loss.

Researchers from the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, have drawn together 200 years' worth of oceanographic knowledge to investigate the distribution of a notorious deep-sea giant – the king crab. The results, published this week in the Journal of Biogeography, reveal temperature as a driving force behind the speciation and radiation of a major seafloor predator; globally, and over tens of millions of years of Earth's history.

A new type of optical particle trap can be used to manipulate bacteria, viruses and other particles on a chip as part of an integrated optofluidic platform. The optical trap is the latest innovation from researchers at the Jack Baskin School of Engineering at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who are developing new sensor technology for biomedical analysis and other applications.

Changing winter conditions are causing Scotland's wild Soay sheep to get smaller despite the evolutionary benefits of having a large body, researchers report in a study that shows how climate change can trump natural selection.

Although the tiny roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans has only 302 neurons in its entire nervous system, studies of this simple animal have significantly advanced our understanding of human brain function because it shares many genes and neurochemical signaling molecules with humans. Now MIT researchers have found novel C. elegans neurochemical receptors, the discovery of which could lead to new therapeutic targets for psychiatric disorders if similar receptors are found in humans.

A similarity in brain disturbance between insects and people suffering from migraines, stroke and epilepsy points the way toward new drug therapies to address these conditions.

We are all familiar with the fact that cognitive function declines as we get older. Moreover, recent studies have shown that the specific kind of daily activities we engage in during the course of our lives appears to influence the extent of this decline. A team of researchers from Technische Universität Berlin are studying how division of labour among honey bees affects their learning performance as they age. Surprisingly, they have found that, by switching their social role, aging honey bees can keep their learning ability intact or even improve it. The scientists are planning to use them as a model to study general aging processes in the brain, and they even hope that they may provide some clues on how to prevent them. Dr. Ricarda Scheiner, leader of the research team, will present these findings at the Society of Experimental Biology Annual Meeting in Glasgow on Wednesday 1st July 2009.

More than 40 percent of a sample of amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds that are restricted to mangrove ecosystems are globally threatened with extinction, according to an assessment published in the July/August issue of BioScience. The study, by David A. Luther of the University of Maryland and Russell Greenberg of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, was based on an extensive literature search and expert consultations. The conclusions emphasize the vulnerability of animals that are dependent on a habitat rapidly being lost or degraded through coastal development, overexploitation, pollution, and changes in sea level and salinity.

For the first time, researchers have been able to identify genetic predictors of the potential success or failure of IVF treatment in blood. Dr. Cathy Allen, from the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin, Ireland, told the 25th annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology today (Wednesday 1 July) that her research would help understand why IVF works for some patients but not for others.

A low dose of oral interferon alpha shows promise in preserving beta cell function for patients with newly diagnosed type 1 diabetes, or juvenile diabetes, according to researchers at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston.

Fifty million years ago, the North and South Poles were ice-free and crocodiles roamed the Arctic. Since then, a long-term decrease in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has cooled the Earth. Researchers at Yale University, the Carnegie Institution of Washington and the University of Sheffield now show that land plants saved the Earth from a deep frozen fate by buffering the removal of atmospheric CO2 over the past 24 million years.

It is based on detecting short, repetitive DNA segments in the genome of bacteria. Every single bacterial strain has such characteristic repeats. "With this method we are able to identify bacterial strains as well as clarify their genetic relationships. Furthermore, we can show how new pathogenic variants develop," says Manfred Höfle, researcher at the HZI. The results have now been published in the current issue of the scientific journal "Applied and Environmental Microbiology". The work is part of the two European Union funded projects "Healthy Water" and "AQUA-chip". Manfred Höfle is coordinator of both projects that deal with various aspects of the microbiological safety of both, drinking water and sea water.