Eduardo Rocha

In an article now published in the journal Current Biology(¹)

Teresa Nogueira

João Martins

Calcium is crucial for heart regeneration by cardiac stem cells following cardiovascular problems say scientists in an article to be published in the journal Circulation Research¹ this 9th of October. The study also identifies the body molecules controlling calcium levels in the stem cells and reveals, how their manipulation, can lead to the formation of new cardiac tissue. The work, that follows the recent surprising discovery of stem cells within the heart, can have important implications in the regenerative medicine of this organ in patients with cardiovascular diseases.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science. Find all the articles here . Read about this project here.

Luísa Pinto (clique para ampliar)

Scientists discovered a gene - called AP2gamma – crucial for the neural development of the visual cortex, in a discovery that can have implications for the therapeutics of neural regeneration as well as provide new clues about how the brain evolved into higher sophistication in mammals. The article will come out on the 13th of September in the journal Nature Neuroscience¹.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science. Find all the articles here . Read about this project here.

Da esquerda para a direita: David Dingli, FACC Chalub, FC Santos, S Van Segbroeck and Jorge M Pacheco

A new paradigm in the way we look at cancer with important implications on how we treat it is about to be published in the British Journal of Cancer¹ by Portuguese, Belgian and American researchers. The group use a mathematical approach to reveal how - by changing the dynamics of interaction between the cancer cells and those of the affected tissue – it is possible to control and even potentially cure the disease. Even more interesting is the fact that this new approach can be used in any number of pathologies where different cells interact.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science. Find all the articles here . Read about this project here.

José Alberto Quartau

Cicadas - better known for providing the soundtrack of our hot summer are remarkably interesting animals, they are the longest living insects – 17 years for some species – but spent 99% of this time underground to then emerge for a few weeks, reproduce and finally die. Now a study of north-African and Mediterranean cicadas by scientists in Portugal and the UK uncover yet more interesting data on the group by revealing that these species although differentiated by their mating calls (and genetically) are, nevertheless, morphologically indistinguishable.

**This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science. Find all the articles here . Read about this project here.

Nuno Sousa

Every day we make a multitude of decisions based on the consequences of our actions (goal-orientated responses). In an always changing environment this capacity is crucial but, because it is complex, it also requires a lot from the brain. So repeated actions - like to press the elevator button to our floor - become linked to other type of neural responses, which are automatic and so less demanding. And if necessary it is always possible to switch back to the first kind of response. But research by Portuguese scientists to be published on the 31st of July in the journal Science¹ now reveals that chronic stress – too many times a feature of modern life - interfere with this switching capacity, by freezing individuals into automatic/habit responses mode.

**This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science. Find all the articles here . Read about this project here

Belinda Xavier

Scientists have just discovered the gene behind Recessive Omodysplasia, a rare skeletal disease characterised by short-limbed dwarfism and craniofacial anomalies. The work, just published in the American Journal of Human Genetics¹, reports the identification, on chromosome 13, of a gene - GPC6 – that is shown to be crucial for normal bone development. The research will allow a better comprehension, as well as prevention, of the disease, by permitting, for example, the screening of potential mutation carriers for pregnancy advise but, and most importantly, will also help to understand better bone development and its molecular bases.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455  

Catarina Homem

A gene called Diaphanous (or Dia) has just been uncovered as a major regulator during embryo formation. The research now published in the journal Development shows how Dia mutations in fruit flies embryos result in a serious of defects during morphogenesis (process by which cells differentiate into tissues and structures), including loss of adhesion, abnormal movements and even migration of cells from one tissue to another. The discovery contributes to a better understanding of how tissue and organ formation is regulated and, consequently, to, one day, be able to intervene therapeutically. Furthermore, the loss of adhesion and abnormal mobility that occurs when Dia is mutated is very similar to what happens during cancer metastases formation, suggesting that this gene might also have a role in cancer.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Ver também http://www.cienciahoje.pt/index.php?oid=25781&op=all

Alexandre Gaspar Maia

A gene crucial for embryonic stem cell pluripotency (the capability to differentiate into any type of cell) is described in the next issue of the journal Nature1. The gene - called Chd¹ – seems to act by maintaining the genetic material open and, in this way, poised to express any gene. Chd1 is also shown to be fundamental when re-activating differentiated tissue cells in order to create new stem cells. The discovery has implications, not only for a better understanding of stem cells unique characteristics, but also for the process of obtaining them from tissue-specific cells avoiding all the problems associated with embryonic stem cells.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455  

Albino Maia

We all know how pleasurable it is too eat a chocolate and how difficult it is, once we started, to stop. Scientists know that it is the recognition of its sweet taste in the mouth, activating the brain to produce dopamine – a neurotransmitter associated with strong feelings of pleasure – that leads to a desire for more. But while this hedonistic effect of food in the brain is well known, new research reveals that calories - per se - can do exactly the same. The study, to be published on the 27th of March issue of the journal Neuron, reveals that not only can calories induce dopamine release - independently of food palatability- but also, that this is done through activation of a same brain area responsive to sweet tastes.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

ND - Ver entrevista com Albino Maia em http://www.cienciahoje.pt/index.php?oid=25727&op=all

Didier Cabanes e Ana Camejo

Scientists in Portugal and France managed to follow the patterns of gene expression in food-poisoning bacteria Listeria monocytogenes (L. monocytogenes) live during infection for the first time. The work about to be published in PLoS Pathogens¹ shows how the bacterial genome shifts to better adapt to infection by activating genes involved in virulence and subversion of the host defences, as well as adaptation to the host conditions. This is the first time that the molecular interactions between L. monocytogenes and its host, as they occur during the different steps of infection, are followed in real time paving the way, not only to the development of new therapies against this potentially lethal bacterium, but also for the study of other pathogen/host interactions.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455

Sandra Ribeiro (clique para ampliar)

Pedro Pereira (clique para ampliar)

The discovery of a new anticoagulant with promising therapeutic value is reported on the 20th of February issue of the journal PLoS ONE(1). Boophilin – as it was named - is particularly interesting due to a capability to block thrombin – probably the most important (and difficult to inhibit) protein in blood clotting – as well as a second pro-coagulant molecule making it the first bivalent thrombin-inhibitor ever described. This specific bivalence suggests that boophilin can be a very effective anti-coagulant even at small quantities, opening the door to the development of new more specific and effective, and so also safer, blood thinning therapies.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Ana Machado

Céu Figueiredo

Heliobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection is considered one of the most important risk factors for stomach (or gastric) cancer with as much as 65% of all cases linked back to the bacteria, although exactly how this occurs is not fully clear. But now researchers in Denmark, Portugal and France, publishing in the journal Clinical Cancer Research¹, show that H. pylori infection contribution to cancer can be linked to at least three independent molecular pathways, which, when disturbed by infection, lead to mutations in the patients’ gastric tissues.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455

Ivo Martins

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) affects as much as 10% of the world population above 65 years of age but after years of research it is still not understood exactly how the disease appears and, even less, how to treat it. But work just published in The EMBO Journal (1) opens the door to new ways for disease intervention by showing that lipids found throughout the brain can dissolve the large insoluble protein plaques characteristic of the disease, releasing their soluble protofibrillar components, and also that it is the soluble components and not the insoluble plaques that provoke neural death.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Pedro Simas

Portuguese scientists discovered a new molecular mechanism that allows gamma herpes viruses to chronically infect patients and helps to explain why these patients present an abnormally high incidence of the lymphocyte (or white blood cell) cancer lymphoma, particularly when their immune system is compromised.

The research, just published in the advance online edition of The Embo Journal ¹, reveals how these viruses mimic the host molecular machinery to shutdown NF-kB –a key regulatory protein complex involved in cell division and death – on infected lymphocytes, and how this - probably by disrupting the cells normal regulatory systems - creates the conditions for the development of lymphomas.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455  

Ana Pombo com Miguel Casanova, co-autor do paper (clique para ampliar)

Embryonic stem cells (ESC) can both self-renew or differentiate into the many cells of the organism and it is crucial to understand the mechanism behind this capability if we want to use them in clinic. Developmental regulator genes are responsible for the activation of many ESC differentiation-pathways and, as such, they are a fundamental key to understand them. And now, research about to be published in Nature Cell Biology, reveals that these genes -always believed to be inactive in ESC before differentiation start - when apparently silent (non-active) are in fact poised, already on the first steps of gene activation only unable to go further due to the presence of repressor molecules.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Tiago Fleming Outeiro

The incidence of Parkinson’s disease (PD) and other neurodegenerative disorders increases with old age although the reason(s) why is not clear. But now in an article to come out this week in the journal Science1 researchers at Harvard describe a direct link between aging and neurodegeneration as well as a potential new treatment against PD. The study shows how inhibition of SIRT2- a member of the sirtuin family, which is linked to aging – prevents the toxicity of the protein aggregates that are believed to be behind the neuronal death characteristic of PD. Interestingly, and contrarily to “classic” approaches that try to eliminate these aggregates, SIRT2 inhibition appears to work by “fusing” many small protein aggregates into larger (apparently less neuro-toxic) ones. The research by showing that aging and neurodegeneration can be linked opens the door to a total new type of therapeutic approaches not only towards PD, but also other neurodegenerative diseases linked to aberrant protein deposits in the brain and known to become worst with age.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Duncan T. Odom

Nuno Barbosa-Morais

Michael D. Wilson

Scientists in Cambridge, UK, using a mouse with a human chromosome in its cells, discovered that gene expression, contrary to what was previously thought, is mostly controlled by regulatory DNA sequences. Mice and humans (and most vertebrates) share the majority of their genes but a distinct gene regulation – so, when and where these shared genes become activated – assures their many individual characteristics, and knowledge of this regulation is crucial if we want one day to be able to control gene expression. These new results - just published on the journal Science – challenge current belief that gene regulation is mediated by a combination of many factors, implying that, to be able to understand the mechanisms behind different specialised cells, scientists will have to track species-specific regulatory pieces of DNA, what will be no easy task. The research has implications in the study of phenomena as diverse as genetic diseases, tissue and organ growth and even cloning.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Nuno Sousa, Universidade do Minho

Research about to published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, resulting from a collaboration between scientists in Germany, Portugal and the UK, suggests that stress contribute directly to the development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). According to the results now published, stress induces the production of amyloid beta (Aß) peptide – the molecule associated with the neural plaques characteristic of the disease – and also makes neurons more vulnerable to Aß toxicity. Administration of glucocorticoids (GC) - the production of which is the first physiological response to stress – was shown to have the same effect, confirming the role of stress in AD. This last result is particularly important as GC are used to treat Alzheimer’s patients and according to this research instead of helping they might be, instead, contributing to the disease.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

J. Pacheco

S. Van Segbroeck

Cooperation, despite being now considered the third force of evolution, just behind mutation and natural selection, is difficult to explain in the context of an evolutionary process based on competition between individuals and selfish behaviour. But this puzzle, that has haunted scientists for decades, is now a little closer to be solved by research about to be published on the journal Physical Review Letters. The work, by scientists in Portugal and Belgium, reveals that an increasing range of behaviours among the individuals of a population leads to cooperation, supporting the idea that democracy - where individuals are free to act as they wish - is in fact the path for better societies.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science: http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455

Katja Wiech

Miguel Farias

Religious emotions and believes have often been linked to a capacity to deal with pain, as those images of Philippine men being willingly crucified during religious festivals so well demonstrate. But although changes in pain sensitivity during a religious experience are well documented, the exact psychological or/and neurological reasons of the phenomenon are unclear and, as such, have now become the aim of an investigation by a group of scientists, philosophers and psychologists from the University of Oxford.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Patricia Maciel

Ana João Rodrigues

Several neurodegenerative diseases are linked to the production of mutated proteins, which accumulate in the brain of patients and are believed to lead to the neurons death characteristic of these disorders. Nevertheless, despite this shared mechanism, each of these diseases is unique, as are the brain areas affected, and to understand them is crucial to identify the biological function of the mutated protein behind the disease, something not always easy. But now, an elegant study just published in the advance online edition of the Faseb(1) journal shows how the study of a simpler genetic model - the worm Caenorhabditis elegans (C.elegans) – was able to give insight into the function of the human protein ataxin-3, which when mutated is linked to Machado-Joseph disease (MJD), a fatal genetic neurodegenerative disorder.

*"This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Luís Pereira

Sandro Alves

Portuguese, Swiss and French researchers show, for the first time, that is possible to inhibit, in a living organism, the mutated copies of a gene without affecting any existing normal copies of the same gene. The research, to appear in the 8th of October edition of the journal PLoS One, describes how scientists successfully used the approach in rats to reverse the symptoms of Machado Joseph Disease (MJD), an untreatable and potentially fatal neurodegenerative disease. If these results can be transferred to humans – and the method is shown to work on isolated human cells - it can, not only become the first available treatment for MJD, but also open the door to promising new safer and more efficient gene therapy for other neurodegenerative disorders, such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Jorge Pacheco e Arne Traulsen, dois dos autores do artigo

The architecture of haematopoiesis – which is the process by which all blood cells originate – is essentially the same throughout the mammal world, report scientists in the Proceedings of the Royal Society. This is an unexpected result considering the thousands of mammals’ species with a myriad of habitats and lifestyles, as so well demonstrated when comparing the 30 mm flying bumblebee bat and the 30 metre-long aquatic blue whale both mammals. But the work now published shows that the variations in the blood system - necessary to adapt to the evolutionary changes found within the mammals’ world - can be explained quantitatively (for example by producing more cells or having the cells dividing faster), and are directly correlated to the animals’ body mass and do not require any fundamental alteration in the haematopoietic process.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Ana Rita Mateus

Scientists in Portugal and Germany report of research that suggest a new therapy to control the spread of tumour cells to new tissues, a process known as metastasis and that is associated with high risk of a fatal outcome. The research, to appear in Human Molecular Genetics, describe how the chaotic, increased motility of some tumour cells, known to be crucial for metastases, can be linked to the aberrant activation of a molecule called epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR). It also shows how inhibition of this activation reverts high motile cells into a normal benign pattern of motility. The research suggests that EGFR inhibitors, which are readily available in the market, could be a potential new therapy in the control of metastases in some type tumours.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Sérgio F. Almeida é o primeiro autor do artigo

The formation of misshaped proteins - a process suggested to be behind neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s – can affect an important molecule of the immune system (MHC class I) says a group of Portuguese scientists in an article to be published on the 15th March issue of the Journal of Immunology1. The researchers have been studying Hereditary Hemochromatosis (HH) – which is also associated with a misshaped/misfolded protein – and discovered that the anomalies in MHC class I molecules observed in some HH patients were linked to a mechanism involved in the elimination of aberrant misfolded proteins.

*"This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Marta D. Santos, Jorge M. Pacheco e Francisco C. Santos

 Why do humans cooperate in things as diverse as environment conservation or the creation of fairer societies, even when they don't receive anything in exchange or, worst, they might even be penalized? This is a question that has puzzled academics for centuries, especially since in evolution the basis for the "survival of the fittest" is, after all, selfishness. But in an article just published in the journal Nature, three Portuguese theoretical physicists developed a mathematical model capable of providing a way out from this conundrum through the introduction of social diversity - a ubiquitous characteristic of modern social networks - and suggesting that that the act of cooperation may depend on one's social context/ranking.

*This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Isabel Gordo

Portuguese scientists in a study just published in the journal Science(1) shows that in bacteria the rate of beneficial mutations – those that increase the capacity of an organism to survive in a particular environment – is much higher than previously thought. In the case of Escherichia coli, the bacteria studied, this is as much as 1,000 times higher than previously believed. The study also suggests that many more genes than previously thought mutate during bacteria adaptation to a new environment. Both results - a much higher rate of advantageous mutations and a bigger number of genes mutating - have important implications for studies in antibiotic resistance and also on how bacteria capacity to attack their host develops.

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Ana Pamplona

Cerebral malaria (CM) is a severe form of malaria that affects the brain and is fatal in about 30-50% of the cases. But scientists in Portugal, in an article about to be published in Nature Medicine, report of a gene – Hmox1 – that protects against the disease by releasing CO into the host blood stream counteracting CM inflammatory processes (CO is known for its inflammatory properties).

* This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Isabel Palmeirim

Susana Pascoal

A fundamental biological question is on how the body plan is organized during embryonic development. Embryos start as a group of non-differentiated cells that divide and eventually specialise into the different tissues and organs of the body. But how do cells know when to go through their different destinies? Research to be published on the 27th of April edition of the Journal of Molecular Biology (1) by a group of Portuguese scientists provides a piece of the puzzle by showing that formation of the cartilage during chicken wing embryonic development is linked to a gene called hairy2, which seems to act as molecular clock helping cells to know when is time to stop dividing and differentiate.

**This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"

Dora Dias-Santagata

New research suggests that oxidative stress – which results from an accumulation of free radicals – is involved in the neurodegeneration observed in dementias such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, whilst the administration of anti-oxidants has the opposite effect and so might help in the control of these types of diseases. The research done by Doras Dias-Santagata, a Portuguese scientist, and colleagues, just published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation is exciting news for neurodegenerative patients all over the world.

* "This article is the result of a project for the divulgation of portuguese science" http://www.cienciahoje.pt/1455"