Archive

The coelacanth is interesting in many respects: until 1938, this fish was thought to have become extinct; it has changed very little in the past 300 million years; and it is considered a predecessor of the first land creatures. Now scientists have decoded its genome.

Broccoli and other plants use mustard oils to ward off pests. These natural substances are also thought to have a preventive effect on cancer. A German-Danish team is now presenting new findings about mustard oils in plant science in “Nature” – with interesting prospects for agriculture.

There is an urgent need for better drugs to treat African sleeping sickness. Würzburg scientists have developed a very promising new agent, which is now to be further optimized.

Individual molecules and their dynamics can also be made visible in living cells using conventional fluorophores at a resolution of around 20 nanometers. How this is done is being revealed for the first time by researchers from Würzburg, Bielefeld, and New York in the journal “Nature Methods”.

If it were not for proton pumps in plants, there would be no acid in wine. These pumps are important generally for plant vitality, as researchers from Würzburg and Heidelberg report in the renowned journal “Proceedings” of the Academy of Sciences in the USA.