Mitochondrial dysfunction has been implicated in bipolar disorder (BD). However, it remains unclear which brain region is affected. Now, researchers from Japan have investigated key brain regions involved in mood regulation (BD symptoms), such as the paraventricular thalamus and medial temporal regions; they found granulovacuolar degeneration in the paraventricular thalamus and verified the accumulation of tau proteins in medial temporal region. These findings pave the way for the development of new treatment strategies for BD.

 

A team of scientists at Kyoto University’s Institute for Integrated Cell-Material Sciences (iCeMS) has created a protein-based therapeutic tool  that could change the way we treat diseases caused by harmful or unnecessary cells. The new tool, published in Nature Biomedical Engineering, involves a synthetic protein called Crunch, short for Connector for Removal of Unwanted Cell Habitat. Crunch uses the body’s natural waste removal system to clear out specific target cells, offering hope for improved treatments for cancer, autoimmune diseases, and other diseases where harmful cells cause damage.

Researchers at the Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) interdisciplinary research group of the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART), Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) research enterprise in Singapore, have developed a powerful tool capable of scanning thousands of biological samples to detect transfer ribonucleic acid (tRNA) modifications — tiny chemical changes to RNA molecules that help control how cells grow, adapt to stress and respond to diseases such as cancer and antibiotic‑resistant infections.

This news article reports on a study revealing the importance of the proboscis monkey's large nose in vocal communication. Researchers used CT scans and computer simulations to demonstrate that the nose's shape modifies the resonant frequencies of calls, creating unique vocal signatures for individual monkeys. This discovery highlights the role of the nose in enhancing vocal identity and provides insights into the evolution of communication, not just in proboscis monkeys but potentially in other species as well. The collaboration between scientists and the Yokohama Zoo Zoorasia opens exciting new avenues for understanding the link between physical traits and social behaviors in the animal kingdom.

In the next 75 years, surface sea temperatures may rise by up to 4°C, with increasingly frequent short-term marine heatwaves also predicted. This could cause significant damage to our essential marine ecosystems, for example with corals widely known to be vulnerable to bleaching. But how will fish fare in these changing climates? In iScience, researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) describe the metabolic and molecular changes that can support young clownfish to adapt to climate change and warming seas. Through genomic and transcriptomic studies across multiple tissues within young clownfish, the team identified the biological processes affected by rising water temperatures. And the outlook is more positive than we may have thought.