Latest Chlamydomonas reinhardtii Stories
University of California, San Diego What can green algae do for science if they weren’t, well, green? That’s the question biologists at UC San Diego sought to answer when they engineered a green alga used commonly in laboratories, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, into a rainbow of different colors by producing six different colored fluorescent proteins in the algae cells. While fluorescent green, red, blue and yellow may be all the rage this year for running shoes and other kinds of...
[ Watch the Video: Biology Helping To Engineer Drugs ] Connie K. Ho for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online Pond scum may be undervalued, but a team of scientists recently discovered it could have biological value. Researchers from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) recently revealed that they have successfully genetically engineered algae that can make a complex, therapeutic drug that is anti-cancer. The researchers believe that the results of the experiment allow for...
Bielefeld University Astonishing research finding by biologists at Bielefeld University published in the online journal Nature Communications Flowers need water and light to grow. Even children learn that plants use sunlight to gather energy from earth and water. Members of Professor Dr. Olaf Kruse’s biological research team at Bielefeld University have made a groundbreaking discovery that one plant has another way of doing this. They have confirmed for the first time that a plant,...
Biologists at the University of California, San Diego have succeeded in engineering algae to produce potential candidates for a vaccine that would prevent transmission of the parasite that causes malaria, an achievement that could pave the way for the development of an inexpensive way to protect billions of people from one of the world's most prevalent and debilitating diseases. Initial proof-of-principle experiments suggest that such a vaccine could prevent malaria transmission. Malaria...
SAN DIEGO, Dec. 5, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Sapphire Energy, Inc., one of the world leaders in algae-based crude oil, today announced that Nucleic Acids Research Journal has published its white paper, "An exogenous chloroplast genome for complex sequence manipulation in algae." As the site of photosynthesis in plants and algae, the chloroplast is responsible for producing organic molecules from atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) and is thus a crucial metabolic engineering target....
CARLSBAD, Calif., Nov. 17, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Life Technologies Corporation (NASDAQ: LIFE) today announced that the company has introduced its GeneArt® Algae Engineering Kits, the first commercially available genetic modification and expression systems for photosynthetic microalgae Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and Synechococcus elongatus. The strains are model organisms for the study of photosynthesis, circadian rhythms and nutrient-regulated gene activity, and are being investigated...
Scientists and engineers seek to meet three goals in the production of biofuels from non-edible sources such as microalgae: efficiency, economical production and ecological sustainability. Syracuse University's Radhakrishna Sureshkumar, professor and chair of biomedical and chemical engineering in the L.C. Smith College of Engineering and Computer Science, and SU chemical engineering Ph.D. student Satvik Wani have uncovered a process that is a promising step toward accomplishing these three...
One of the most pivotal steps in evolution-the transition from unicellular to multicellular organisms-may not have required as much retooling as commonly believed, found a globe-spanning collaboration of scientists led by researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and the US Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute.A comparison of the genomes of the multicellular algae Volvox carteri and its closest unicellular relative Chlamydomonas reinhardtii revealed that multicellular...
A multicellular green alga, Volvox carteri, may have finally unlocked the secrets behind the evolution of different sexes. A team led by researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies has shown that the genetic region that determines sex in Volvox has changed dramatically relative to that of the closely related unicellular alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii.Their findings, which will be published in the April 16th issue of the journal Science, provide the first empirical support for a...
An international team of scientists, including two from Arizona State University, have taken a significant step closer to unlocking the secrets of photosynthesis, and possibly to cleaner fuels.Plants and algae, as well as cyanobacteria, use photosynthesis to produce oxygen and "fuels," the latter being oxidizable substances like carbohydrates and hydrogen. There are two pigment-protein complexes that orchestrate the primary reactions of light in oxygenic photosynthesis: photosystem...
