All Questions
10
votes
1answer
283 views
Alternatives to TBE buffer for denaturing polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis of DNA and RNA?
I just stumbled upon an article promoting 10 mM sodium borate as an alternative to the well-known TAE and TBE buffers for agarose gel electrophoresis of DNA (Brody & Kern, 2004). They claim that ...
-4
votes
1answer
43 views
What are the long-term negative effects of going without water/food for a period of time [closed]
There are no good answers anywhere. so asking: this is not about days of survival without water. This is about long-term negative effects induced from not drinking water for at least the mentioned ...
2
votes
1answer
50 views
Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium: To compute probability of finding two siblings (random mating)
I've been working a little with M. G. Bulmer's Principles of Statistics (Dover, 1979) and cannot see how to properly compute half of one question. This should be a basic probability computation, but I ...
0
votes
0answers
29 views
Size order of human organs
Wikipedia states that the liver is the largest internal organ in the human body.
How does it relate to the sizes of ex. the lungs and small intestines? I've been having this personal image for years ...
0
votes
1answer
29 views
Could a person become physically transgender through artificial means?
Let's say there's a girl who carries a few masculine traits not normal in most girls, such as a high level of testosterone; we know there are countless reasons why something like this could happen, ...
2
votes
2answers
62 views
What chemicals and structures control the *direction* of plant growth in leaves, stems and roots?
If you want a specific plant, let's say the snap peas I am growing that I bought at Agway. I noticed that they grow towards the light source through the nearby window. Also I think roots work the same ...
3
votes
3answers
314 views
Are there verbs for “undergo mitosis” and “undergo meiosis”?
From my experience on SE sites, I believe this is the right site to ask this question under "terminology".
I've been trying to find out whether English has one-word verbs for "undergo mitosis" and ...
1
vote
1answer
94 views
Why does non-continuous sleep makes you feel tired?
Let's say, hypothetically, that you fell asleep at 10PM, and you were woken up by a noise at 1AM. If you went back to sleep immediately and woke up at 6AM, you will feel tired even though you had ...
9
votes
1answer
101 views
What light intensity starts melatonin release in humans?
I'm interested in whether any studies have determined the intensity of light at eye level that starts melatonin release in humans.
I know that:
melatonin release is suppressed by blue light with ...
1
vote
1answer
32 views
How do animals/plants change for each season?
The question pretty much sums it up. How do animals/plants change for each: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter?
A detailed explanation on distinct behaviour and appearance changes would be nice.
2
votes
3answers
45 views
What biochemical molecule viewer allows for changes in amino acids and resulting tertiary structure?
I am familiar with the Jmol, Rasmol and PyMoL softwares, and was recently introduced to BioBlender. However, I am completely unaware if any of these programs (or others) are capable of loading a .pdb ...
6
votes
3answers
177 views
Compressing structural information in PDB files
There seems to be a lot of redundancy in PDB files. These files can of course be compressed with general-purpose compression programs like gzip, but I can't help but imagine that these tools are ...
2
votes
3answers
78 views
What percentage of protein isoforms have different functions?
I am looking for studies on how many protein isoforms have different functions, preferably in human. We know that a great many, if not most, of human genes are alternatively spliced and that many ...
3
votes
1answer
45 views
Why it is so difficult to treat leukemia?
I want to ask what is the reason that T315I type CML leukemia is currently untreatable. I have read quite a few papers in this subject. Why the current genetic oriented engineering drugs failed to ...
3
votes
1answer
37 views
Understanding these SNP annotations
I am looking at the PharmaPGKB database for SNPs and trying to understand what the following annotation means:
rs1801131 at 1:11854475 in CLCN6, MTHFR (VIP)
Ok, ...
0
votes
1answer
31 views
Digestion system startup?
Is it true that the human digestion system needs a startup in the morning?
Meaning that if u want to lose weight it can be beneficial to eat in the morning instead of skipping that meal?
Also does ...
9
votes
2answers
113 views
Does human digestive system benefit from eating same kind of food consistently?
Here's the reason why I'm asking: I've heard that it takes some time for pets(cats/dogs) to adjust to a different dry feed, where the new feed has to be mixed with the old one, slowly replacing the ...
-1
votes
0answers
36 views
What will happen if cat becomes intelligent and develops a civilization? [closed]
How will it be different from ours? How can we imagine it?
-1
votes
0answers
57 views
Are sharks everything that are not sharks? [closed]
Is this true:
shark = not things that are not a shark
∴
shark = not not sharks
?
Sharks
Things that are not sharks
1
vote
0answers
29 views
Why do ion concentrations change with different secretion rates in pancreatic juice?
Why is it that when secretory rate increases in the pancreas the concentration of chloride ions decreases, and the concentration of bicarbonate increases in the production of isotonic NaCl secretion?
...
2
votes
1answer
29 views
Up to date B cell review
Where would I find an up to date (last 6-7 years max) review on B cells? I've tried searching through pubmed with filters, cochrane library, medline and various other resources including searching old ...
0
votes
2answers
149 views
Do cockroaches have less health issues than humans?
Cockroaches are known to live in very dirty places like sewers. Does this cause them to evolve to be stronger against parasites and bacteria? Recently I read online that cockroaches can sustain ...
0
votes
2answers
35 views
More proteins from diet when common cold and flu?
My coach says that I need to eat 1.2 - 1.5 grams of proteins per kilogram when I have a common cold and flu.
I normally eat one gram of proteins per kilogram, while double it when doing my exercise ...
3
votes
1answer
80 views
How does paracetamol interfere with immune system?
Paracetamol is used to reduce body temperature when it is to high. The high body temperature (fever) is known to be an indication that immune system fights against an infection.
In this context I ...
3
votes
1answer
67 views
Results of a complete DNA sequencing - are they 100% reusable?
Is that correct that a complete DNA sequencing (the whole genome) need only to be done once (per person)?
After that is done, it the complete genome can be stored and once the new genes (and they ...
3
votes
1answer
45 views
How do I view the simulated protein structure along with ligand in VMD?
I did a simulation of a protein-ligand complex, and it has stabilized after 5 ns. I have got the respective pdb files for every ns, but when I try to view in VMD (Visual Molecular Dynamics), I cannot ...
1
vote
2answers
58 views
HIV and T helper cells
As far as I know and could understand from reading about HIV, T helper cell is one of the main reasons to develop AIDS in patients infected with HIV virus, that because the absence of helper T cell ...
2
votes
2answers
45 views
What mechanism suppresses melatonin release in humans?
I'm looking at melanopsin, a photo pigment in the human eye. One of its actions is to trigger suprachiasmatic nuclei SCN to suppress melatonin release. I'm interested in learning what is the exact ...
1
vote
1answer
42 views
Role of Fbx15 in ES cells and its use in assaying for iPS cells (Yamanaka paper and others)?
I am trying to understand the assay for iPS cells in the Takahashi & Yamanaka 2006 paper.
They inserted a beta-geo cassette, which contains the neomycin resistance gene, into the Fbx15 gene. The ...
2
votes
2answers
37 views
Are there inherent problems in simulating marine environments, as compared to terrestrial systems?
We cultivate a number of terrestrial organisms in greenhouses and stables where they live in completely artificial environments. This seems to extend far less to marine organisms, such as fish. ...
3
votes
2answers
111 views
Physiological indicators of happiness and well being
If I understand it correctly, levels of serotonin in the brain can indicate if a person is happy. What other physiological measures indicate happiness or well being for a humans?
I am looking for ...
2
votes
0answers
20 views
Size of classical liver lobule across species
A classical liver lobule is made up of a central vein and the portal triads. A typical human liver weighs around 3 lbs. , while a typical bovine liver weighs around 12 lbs. I was wondering if anyone ...
1
vote
0answers
62 views
How does geography affect morphological features of the human body
I've seen many times how a person born in one place, goes to another country for a long time, and then they start looking more like the people there, but I never found out how it works.
This report ...
2
votes
1answer
301 views
Why are bacteria and archaea in different domains?
As I understand it, the main difference between the Bacteria and the Eucaryota domains are that eukaryotes have a nucleus and bacteria don't. I understand that bacteria and archaebacteria have enough ...
9
votes
2answers
1k views
Why is PEG important for efficient yeast transformation?
One way to do an yeast transformation is by using lithium acetate, a single-stranded carrier DNA, and PEG (1). I was wondering why is the polyethylene glycol important for the efficient ...
1
vote
1answer
244 views
How does inorganic phosphate inhibit alkaline phosphatase?
I want to know how is inorganic phosphate able to inhibit alkaline phosphatase.
-2
votes
0answers
54 views
What was behind the evolution of human brain? [closed]
Why did the human brain evolve!?
certainly it was not selective evolution, it seems something inside DNA forced human to evolve through brain
Evolution (or development process of human) is more ...
2
votes
1answer
77 views
The oldest common ancesstor of all human beings
Do all human beings have a single oldest ancestor (a man and a woman), or were there were many ancestors at the same time at different places on earth?
This article sheds some light. Is there another ...
3
votes
2answers
124 views
What is the function of nodes of Ranvier in axons?
In a neuroscience class I'm taking, it was explained that myelin covers axons in sections, the uncovered sections are called nodes of Ranvier, and signals propagate much faster in the covered ...
3
votes
1answer
37 views
How does sugar enter neurons if they don't use insulin?
I heard somewhere that as opposed to other cells, neurons do not use insulin to get their sugar supply.
Why is that?
What is the alternative mechanism? I assume sugar can't just enter the cell ...
0
votes
1answer
38 views
Which Enzymes Catalyse the Deacetylation of Drugs in the Human Body?
If you would like more specifics seeing how I realise that this question is very broad and may be difficult to answer in general then hopefully the following will help you out:
I am particularly ...
1
vote
0answers
26 views
Why do animals sleep
Animals spend a good portion of every day doing nothing, and it seems like that time could be better spent hunting, searching for mates, etc. Also, animals are not aware during sleep, so it would be ...
1
vote
2answers
77 views
How to know if a woman is fertile without actually making her pregnant?
How to know if a human female is fertile (can give birth to child in future) without making her pregnant? Any signs, tests?
13
votes
4answers
647 views
Can two humans with 44 chromosomes produce viable offspring?
It is known that there are very few individuals having 44 chromosomes, not the usual 46 chromosomes.
One example is a male in China: the first article, the second article.
The other is a female in ...
2
votes
1answer
44 views
How long does a tan last?
How long do melanocytes and melanosomes continue to protect DNA after UV exposure? Basically, if skin is tanned, then over the next month it is shed, will melanocytes continue to produce high levels ...
1
vote
2answers
73 views
Iron deficiency anemia symptoms explanation
In my classes and on the internet, brittle nails and dry hair (or hair loss) are described as symptoms of iron deficiency anemia, but none explains the cause of such symptoms.
Does anyone have any ...
4
votes
1answer
53 views
Intrinsic apoptosis in erythrocytes
With a lack of mitochondria, can red blood cells perform intrinsic apoptosis and do they have another way of generating cytochrome c to attach to a CARD domain and assemble the apoptosome?
Or are ...
9
votes
2answers
599 views
What is Peter's rule in neuroscience?
I have heard and read about Peter's rule informally in the past, but never saw a formal definition or description.
Informally I have learned to understand Peter's rule as the assumed correlation ...
2
votes
0answers
29 views
Can Infant Crocodiles digest Bread?
I'm just curious as to whether crocodiles and if you require specifics, saltwater crocodiles, could eat bread as infants. I was watching Lake Placid and I was curious as to whether infant saltwater ...
1
vote
3answers
94 views
Separating DNA Fragments by Gel Electrophoresis. Are all the strands for one size the same?
My apologies if my question is too basic, and please point me to a more appropriate forum. I am reading the textbook "Essential Cell Biology" by Alberts et al, and am consulting other sources as ...
