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A new hope for a therapy against retinitis pigmentosa
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Retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative genetic disease of the eye, is characterized by progressive vision loss, usually leading to blindness. In some patients, structural defects in the photoreceptor cells have been observed, but the molecular mechanisms involved are not understood. The … Continue reading
Olfactory neurons adapt to the surrounding environment
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Olfactory receptors, present on the surface of sensory neurons in the nasal cavity, recognize odorant molecules and relay this information to the brain. How do these neurons manage to detect a large variability of signals and adapt to different levels … Continue reading
Antisense-mediated repression of SAGA-dependent genes involves the HIR histone chaperone
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While the spotlight has been for a long time on coding transcription, it turns out that noncoding transcription is largely predominant in a eukaryotic cell. The pervasiveness of non-coding transcription might have functional consequences: many non-coding transcripts overlap with promoter … Continue reading
Breast cancer: why metastasis spreads to the bone
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When cancer cells break away from a primary tumor and migrate to other organs, this is called «metastatic cancer». The organs affected by these metastases, however, depend in part on their tissue of origin. In the case of breast cancer, … Continue reading
Limiting energy in neurons exacerbates epilepsy
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Epilepsy, one of the most common neurological disorders, is characterized by the spontaneous repetition of seizures caused by the hyperactivity of a group of neurons in the brain. Could we therefore reduce neuronal hyperactivity, and treat epilepsy, by reducing the … Continue reading