DRUG 'DANCE' REVEALED

Researchers in the US and Belgium used a synchrotron to produce 3D images of a molecular ‘dance’ involving an important hormone receptor that is a common target for drugs used to combat asthma and blood pressure problems. This provides new information about the process of signalling across cell membranes, which is a key part of the body’s response to drug treatments.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vnfv/ncurrent/full/nature10361.html
http://www.vib.be/en/news/Pages/Common-drugs-initiate-a-molecular-pas-de-quatre-at-the-surface-of-the-cell-membrane.aspx

NEXT-GENERATION MEMORY AND SENSING DEVICES

US scientists have found a new way that electric and magnetic properties can be coupled in a material. Called ‘multiferroics’ – magnetic materials with north and south poles that can be reversed with an electric field, these materials are rare in nature.

http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/pubaf/pr/PR_display.asp?prID=1313
http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i5/e057201

WHAT ELECTRONS DO IN HIGH-TEMPERATURE SUPERCONDUCTORS

Theoretical physicists are excited! Calculations based on a new theory about how electrons behave in high-temperature superconductors agree well with synchrotron data. Although high-temperature superconductors are already in use, their unusual properties have so far evaded explanation.

http://news.ucsc.edu/2011/07/high-temperature-superconductors.html
http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i5/e056403
http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i5/e056404

DO WE HAVE A NEW ANCESTOR?

Paleoanthropologists from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg have used the European Synchrotron Research Facility (ESRF) to investigate fossil remains that may provide evidence of the first species enough like us to be called human.

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/08/malapa-fossils/fischman-text