Crystals And Catalysts

Cataracts are primarily a disease of ageing. Instead of an operating to remove them, researchers are trying to make a cataract-dissolving-eye drops which can break down cataracts and restore transparency of the lens and vision.  Cataracts can be successfully removed with surgery, but this method is costly, and most individuals blinded by severe cataracts in developing countries go untreated. A characteristic of the condition is the mis-folding and clumping together of crucial proteins known as crystallins. So that our lenses are able to function well, crystallins (which we are born and live our whole lives with) must maintain both the transparency of fibre cells and their flexibility as the eyes' muscles constantly stretch and relax the lens to allow us to focus on objects at different distances.  Scientists at the University of California San Francisco exploited a key difference between correctly folded crystallins and their amyloid forms; finding that amyloids are much harder

Autumn is easing its way in and the leaves are turning orange and brown hues and the pumpkin spice latte is making a major comeback. So surely everyone is starting to feel it's autumn now.  The PSL is now the official symbol of autumn - forget the weather or the leaves changing colour. Pumpkin Spice Latte Image Anybody who has tried the PSL and tasted it knows that it doesn’t even taste of pumpkin, nor does it have any of its nutritional benefits.   A cooked, mashed cup of it has most, if not all of your daily vitamin A and a significant percentage of both your daily potassium and fibre. Recently, the autumnal drink has been in the news for its recipe, which doesn't include real pumpkin or real, natural flavours. All flavours are replaced with chemicals which make up the flavouring. The caffeinated drink now has pumpkin included in it as of this year, part of the recipe.   In between a yoga retreat and a vision quest, I made a big decision to use real pumpkin. My

In this past year, my blog has been seen internationally in countries I would have never even dreamed of being seen in (which I think is absolutely amazing). My first priority for this blog is to ensure that everyone enjoys reading my new posts and understands them really well. I even have a google translate button in the sidebar. But as we all know, sometimes (or more often than not) google translate doesn’t always correctly translate text in the ways its supposed to be. I'd like to thank a really good friend of mine, who has offered to translate one of my blog posts in Arabic so that my blog could reach more corners of the earth. Enjoy!

Journal: Exploring Host-Microbiome Interactions using an in Silico Model of biomimetic robots and engineered living cells – Published in Scientific Reports. Dr’s : Heyde and Ruder Funded by : National science Foundation, USA Understanding the human body is vital to understanding how the body works and how drugs can interact with the body. Microbiomes play an important role in the regulation of the behaviour and health of its host (which could be the human body or part of it). Within this new piece of research, scientists have prepared an in silico model of a living microbiome, engineered with synthetic biology, which interfaces with a biomimetic, robotic host. They used this technique to copy complex behaviours in the host giving larger understandings of the exploration of inter-kingdom ecological relationships.  The researchers studied two different topologies of information flow, critical for host-microbiome interactions to help us understand biochemical

This weeks science news: understanding speech and sleep, fatty diets that harm the brain, fake pills, restricting antibiotics and asthma caused by pollution. Click to enlarge image!

This weeks science news includes: More reasons to love chocolate, ways to reverse colorectal cancer and also heart damage, and why watching cat videos are good for you! Click to enlarge image!