Exposure to alcohol during the first weeks of embryonic development changes gene activity and cellular metabolism. In laboratory cultures, it was found that the first cells of the nervous system are the most sensitive to alcohol. This supports the current recommendation to abstain from alcohol already when planning a pregnancy.

Published 23 April, 2025

Researchers have synthesized a new allohexaploid wheat, Triticum kiharae, and demonstrated a feasible route to simultaneously introgress standing genetic variations from both the Timopheevii wheat (T. timopheevii) and goat-grass (Aegilops tauschii), as well as heritable de novo variations that have arisen in T. kiharae, into common wheat.

Currently, the main method of combatting CoTS outbreaks is by manually culling each starfish one-by-one, which is highly inefficient, labor-intensive, and costly. But now, a team of researchers from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), the University of the Sunshine Coast in Australia, and the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) in Japan have discovered that CoTS use their characteristic spines to ‘smell’ peptides and communicate with one another, even outside mating seasons. Building on this finding, the team has created a synthetic peptide that consistently attracts CoTS at very low concentrations and with no toxicity. The results are published in iScience. Their discovery could lead to the further development of potent pest-management peptides – dubbed Acanthaster attractins – that prompts the starfish to congregate at one spot, enabling the efficient removal of many CoTS in one sweep.

An interdisciplinary research team led by the Leibniz-HKI in Jena has discovered a new group of bioactive natural compounds in pathogenic bacteria of the genus Pandoraea: pandorabactins. They enable the bacteria to extract vital iron from other microorganisms and can thus influence the microbial balance in the human lung. The results of the study were published in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

Using the now-decommissioned Summit supercomputer, researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory ran the largest and most accurate molecular dynamics simulations yet of the interface between water and air during a chemical reaction. 

Researchers from The University of Osaka found that Oxr1 and Ncoa7 regulate the vacuolar-type proton pump ATPase on the membrane of the Golgi apparatus and trans-Golgi network to maintain their luminal pH. Inhibition of Oxr1 and Ncoa7 function disrupts glycosylation, a key enzymatic process that takes place in these organelles, providing new insight into the mechanisms underlying congenital disorders of glycosylation.