max planck institute

(German Center for Research and Innovation) A discussion on TB research and the current state of immunobiology at the German Center for Research and Innovation (GCRI) on Thursday, March 31.

Featuring Professor Stefan H.E. Kaufmann (Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology), Dr. Carl Nathan (Weill Cornell Medical College), and Dr.

Ann Ginsberg (Global Alliance for TB Drug Development).

(Max-Planck-Gesellschaft) The human brain consists of approximately one hundred billion nerve cells. Each of these cells needs to connect to specific other cells during the brain's development in order to form a fully functional organism.

Yet how does a nerve cell know where it should grow and which cells to contact? Scientists of the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology in Martinsried have now shown that growing nerve cells realise when they've reached their target area in the fly brain thanks to the interaction of two genes.

(University Hospital Heidelberg) If mice are administered an antibiotic for three days and are simultaneously infected with malaria, no parasites appear in the blood and life-threatening disease is averted.

In addition, the animals treated in this manner also develop robust, long-term immunity against subsequent infections.

This discovery was made by the team headed by Dr. Steffen Borrmann from the Department of Infectious Diseases at Heidelberg University Hospital in cooperation with Dr.

Kai Matuschewski of the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin.

(Max-Planck-Gesellschaft) A breakthrough in decoding gene regulation of Helicobacter pylori has been made by an international research team led by Jorg Vogel of the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin.

Using a newly developed sequencing technique, the researchers discovered 60 small ribonucleic acids -- tiny RNA-particles which can regulate genes -- in the genome of this human pathogen.

These findings could facilitate the development of new therapeutic strategies against this widespread pathogen.

(Indiana University) Cognitive scientists from Indiana U. and the Max Planck Institute for Human Development compared the dieting behavior of women following two radically different diets.

The more complicated people found their diet plans, the sooner they were likely to bail. "For people on a more complex diet that involves keeping track of quantities and items eaten, their subjective impression of the difficulty of the diet can lead them to give up on it," said one researcher.

(Max-Planck-Gesellschaft) A new study of the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Aging could help to understand the positive effect of dietary restriction on healthy aging.

Previous evidence from different organisms (fruit flies and mice) have shown that dietary restriction increases longevity, but with a potential negative side effect of diminished fertility.