Latest James Berger Stories

New action mechanism for topoisomerases could help improve antibiotics, anticancer drugsMany standard antibiotics and anti-cancer drugs block the enzymes that snip the kinks and knots out of DNA "“ DNA tangles are lethal to cells "“ but the drugs are increasingly encountering resistant bacteria and tumors.A new discovery by University of California, Berkeley, biochemists could pave the way for new research into how to re-design these drugs to make them more effective poisons for cancer...

The atomic-level action of a remarkable class of ring-shaped protein motors has been uncovered by researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) using a state-of-the-art protein crystallography beamline at the Advanced Light Source (ALS). These protein motors play pivotal roles in gene expression and replication, and are vital to the survival of all biological cells, as well as infectious agents, such as the human papillomavirus, which has been linked to cervical...