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Categories: Biology: Microbiology, Paleontology: Fossils

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Scientists have succeeded in achieving the world's first pregnancy of a rhinoceros after an embryo transfer. The southern white rhino embryo was produced in vitro from collected egg cells and sperm and transferred into a southern white rhino surrogate mother at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya on September 24, 2023. The BioRescue team confirmed a pregnancy of 70 days with a well-developed 6.4 cm long male embryo. The successful embryo transfer and pregnancy are a proof of concept and allow to now safely move to the transfer of northern white rhino embryos -- a cornerstone in the mission to save the northern white rhino from extinction.

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UNSW Sydney medical scientists have cracked a mystery whose solution has long eluded researchers. UNSW Sydney medical scientists have cracked a mystery whose solution has long eluded researchers.

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An immune component of breast milk known as the complement system shapes the gut environment of infant mice in ways that make them less susceptible to certain disease-causing bacteria, according to a new study.

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DNA from ancient feces can offer archaeologists new clues about the life and health of Japanese people who lived thousands of years ago, according to a new study.

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An estimated 1,600 people in the U.S. contract a serious infection from Listeria bacteria in food each year and, of those individuals, about 260 people die, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers may now better understand how the bacteria, called Listeria monocytogenes, survive and persist in fruit-packing plants by evading and surviving sanitizers.

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Researchers have made a pivotal discovery in the field of cellular microscopy. The team has successfully developed Two-Color Infrared Photothermal Microscopy (2C-IPM), a novel technology designed to investigate neutral lipids within lipid droplets of living cells. This new microscopy can be used with isotope labeling, which allows for the detailed monitoring of neutral lipid synthesis within individual lipid droplets.

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The brown bear is one of the largest living terrestrial carnivores, and is widely distributed across the Northern Hemisphere. Unlike many other large carnivores that went extinct at the end of the last Ice Age (cave bear, sabretoothed cats, cave hyena), the brown bear is one of the lucky survivors that made it through to the present. The question has puzzled biologists for close to a century -- how was this so?

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Plants produce a range of chemicals known as volatile organic compounds that influence their interactions with the world around them. In a new study, researchers investigated how the type and amount of these VOCs change based on different features of tomato plants.

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Researchers showed that the way in which genes are turned on and off as bacteria grow provide clues to their regulation.

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Researchers have discovered the genetic material of the pathogen Treponema pallidum in the bones of people who died in Brazil 2,000 years ago. This is the oldest verified discovery of this pathogen thus far, and it proves that humans were suffering from diseases akin to syphilis -- known as treponematoses -- long before Columbus's discovery of America. The new findings call into question previous theories concerning the spread of syphilis by the Spanish conquistadors.

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Microorganisms were the first forms of life on our planet. The clues are written in 3.5 billion-year-old rocks by geochemical and morphological traces, such as chemical compounds or structures that these organisms left behind. However, it is still not clear when and where life originated on Earth and when a diversity of species developed in these early microbial communities. Evidence is scarce and often disputed. Now, researchers have uncovered key findings about the earliest forms of life. In rock samples from South Africa, they found evidence dating to around 3.42 billion years ago of an unprecedentedly diverse carbon cycle involving various microorganisms. This research shows that complex microbial communities already existed in the ecosystems during the Palaeoarchaean period.

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Reactive oxygen species (ROS), though generally regarded as toxic byproducts of biological processes, serve many important functions in plants. However, the precise mechanism that plants use to regulate the production of ROS remains elusive. In a recent study, researchers clarified how an important ROS-generating enzyme is activated, revealing mechanisms likely conserved across all land plants. Their findings could pave the way for breakthroughs in agricultural and environmental remediation tools.

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Ecologists have long known that standing dead trees, commonly referred to as snags, are an important habitat element for forest dwellers and act as a driver of biodiversity. They're so important that in some managed forests, snag creation is part of the conservation tool kit -- i.e., crews sometimes convert a percentage of live trees into dead ones through techniques ranging from sawing off their tops to wounding their trunks to injecting them with disease-causing fungi.

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In a new study, two species of bacteria grown in a lab reversed their predator-prey relationship after one species was grown at a lower temperature.

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Of all the organisms that photosynthesize, land plants have the most complex form. How did this morphology emerge? A team of scientists has taken a deep dive into the evolutionary history of morphological complexity in streptophytes, which include land plants and many green algae. Their research allowed them to go back in time to investigate lineages that emerged long before land plants existed.

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A newly published study provides guidance for building accurate mathematical models for gene regulatory networks.

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By tightly regulating nitrogen uptake, microorganisms avoid overeating nitrogen and thus wasting energy. Scientists now reveal how some methanogenic archaea manage to do so.

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Gliding winged-reptiles were amongst the ancient crocodile residents of the Mendip Hills in Somerset, England, researchers at the have revealed.

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A new study shows the Megalodon, a gigantic shark that went extinct 3.6 million years ago, was more slender than earlier studies suggested. This finding changes scientists' understanding of Megalodon behavior, ancient ocean life, and why the sharks went extinct.

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You suddenly feel sick -- pathogenic bacteria have managed to colonize and spread in your body! The weapons they use for their invasion are harmful toxins that target the host's defense mechanisms and vital cell functions. Before these deadly toxins can attack host cells, bacteria must first export them from their production site -- the cytoplasm -- using dedicated secretion systems.