A team of scientists from Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS) of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) have shown how proteins involved in controlling genes work together to carry out their functions in stem cells and demonstrated for the very first time, how they can change interaction partners to make other types of cells. The work highlighted the collaborative nature of modern biology in which techniques and knowledge from bioinformatics analysis, structural biology, biochemistry and stem cell molecular biology were used together to find the specific amino acid within the protein that facilitated the molecular switch between stem cells and other types of cells.

After years of poring through images from space and debating where on Mars the next NASA rover should land, it comes down to four choices.
Scientists in the close-knit Mars research community get one last chance to make their case this week when they gather before the "judges" - the team running the $2.5 billion mission that will soon suggest a landing site to NASA, the ultimate decider.

"Dark energy" does exist, and it's not Albert Einstein's "greatest blunder" in his theory of gravity, say planetary scientists.

"Dark energy" is a concept first cast by Einstein in his original 'Theory of General Relativity' . The scientist included the idea in his original equations but later ruefully admitted that it was "his greatest blunder" .

The most dangerous place on Earth. It sounds like the title of an action-adventure movie. And it conjures up all kinds of images -- war, earthquakes, poisonous jungle plants, killer animals, disease, terrorists and violent criminals at every turn.

How natural fruit and vegetables are packed with more nutrients.
Switching to organic produce could help you live longer as well as keeping you healthier and slimmer, say academics.
Fruit and vegetables grown without artificial  fertilisers have significantly more key nutrients, including vitamin C.
As a result, going organic can extend



Tiny satellite

 Draper Laboratory and MIT have developed a satellite the size of a loaf of bread that will undertake one of the biggest tasks in astronomy: finding Earthlike planets beyond our solar system—or exoplanets—that could support life. It is scheduled to launch in 2012.
The "nanosatellite," called ExoPlanetSat, packs powerful, high-performance optics and new control and stabilization technology in a small package.

Humans have long dreamed of leaving Earth behind and living in outer space. But turning the dream into reality is not as easy as "Star Trek" would make it seem. The main problem, of course, is that humans have a fair number of requirements to survive.

In the latest scientific version of Genesis, life begins, paradoxically, with an act of destruction. After 10 billion years of guzzling the hydrogen in its core, a sun-size star runs out of nuclear fuel and becomes unstable. It goes through a series of convulsions and expels a shell of searing-hot atoms—including hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen. The star fizzles into an inert cinder, and its atoms drift off, seemingly lost in the interstellar gloom.