During periods known as Snowball Earth, between 720 and 635 million years ago, early eukaryotes — complex cellular lifeforms that eventually evolved...
Giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) belong to the order Carnivora, but they mainly feed on bamboo, and their unique dietary adaptability has always been...
Aquatic, tailed amphibians called newts have large genomes harboring many repeat elements. How these elements shape the genome and relate to newts’ unique...
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New research led by scientists from the University of Pennsylvania, Karolinska Institute and Linköping University provides a landscape view of the human...
In new research, a team of scientists from Virginia Tech examined how widespread exposure to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2),...
Biologists from Altos Labs-Cambridge Institute of Science, the University of Cambridge and elsewhere have found that a retrovirus-derived genetic element...
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has had a tremendous impact on humanity. Prevention of transmission by disinfection of...
Scientists from Stockholm University, the Arctic University of Norway, Lund University and Karolinska Institute have extracted, sequenced and analyzed...
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‘Jumping genes,’ also known as transposons or transposable elements, widely contribute to the evolution of genomes allowing genomic innovations. These...
Using state-of-the-art analytical techniques, researchers have detected diverse suites of nucleobases — including canonical base pairs (e.g., adenine-uracil,...
Queensland Brain Institute’s Dr. Timothy Bredy and colleagues have discovered an experience-induced non-coding RNA, named ADRAM (activity-dependent lncRNA...
Meditation is an effective behavioral intervention for treating various conditions associated with a weakened immune system, according to new research...
The genomes of multiple East Asian populations bear the signature of a viral epidemic that occurred approximately 900 generations, or 25,000 years (28...
A team of researchers from Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, the University of Southern California, the Beckman Research Institute of the City...
The silverleaf whitefly (Bemisia tabaci) incorporated a gene called BtPMaT1 from plants into its genome roughly 35 million years ago and now uses it to...
Formerly thought to be ‘junk DNA,’ microRNAs (miRNAs) are small chains of about two dozen non-coding nucleotides. They are emerging as important regulators...
![Ternary structure of Polθ on a DNA/RNA primer-template: (A) Polθ polymerase; (B) DNA/RNA extension by Polθ and PolθΔL; (C) structure of Polθ:DNA/RNA:ddGTP; (D) superposition of Polθ:DNA/RNA (marine) and Polθ:DNA/DNA (orange, 4x0q); the fingers and thumb subdomains undergo reconfiguration; (E) superposition of Polθ:DNA/RNA (marine) and Polθ:DNA/DNA (orange, 4x0q) highlighting a 12-Å shift of K2181 (blue box; thumb) and a 4.4-Å shift of E2246 (gray box; palm); (F) superposition of nucleic acids and ddGTP from Polθ:DNA/RNA:ddGTP and Polθ:DNA/DNA:ddGTP structures; (G) top: electron density of ddGTP and 3′ primer terminus in Polθ:DNA/RNA structure; bottom: zoomed-in image of the superposition of active sites, illustrating a different conformation of ddGTP in the Polθ:DNA/RNA (blue) and Polθ:DNA/DNA (salmon) complexes; (H) interactions between ribose 2’-hydroxyl groups of the RNA template and residues in the Polθ:DNA/RNA structure; red dashed lines, hydrogen bonds; (I) DNA/RNA used for cocrystallization with Polθ and ddGTP (top); strong electron density is present for four base pairs [nucleotides located at positions 2 to 5 (underlined) of the DNA/RNA] and two base pairs resulting from an incorporated ddGMP (2’,3’ dideoxyguanosine monophosphate) (green; position 1) and a bound unincorporated ddGTP (red; position 0) in the active site (top); interactions between Polθ and nucleic acids in Polθ:DNA/RNA:ddGTP (bottom); interactions between residues and phosphate backbone, sugar oxygen, or nucleobase are shown in blue, yellow, and green, respectively; hydrogen bonds between Polθ and ribose 2’-hydroxyl groups are indicated (boxed residues); (J) interactions between Polθ and nucleic acids in Polθ:DNA/DNA:ddGTP (4x0q); color scheme identical to (I). Image credit: Chandramouly et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abf1771.](https://cdn.sci.news/images/2021/06/image_9759-Polymerase-Theta-195x110.jpg)
