MBL Ecosystems Center scientists Jim Tang and Faming Wang are among the authors of this research, which was conducted at a Cape Cod salt marsh. By Elizabeth Pennisi, Science LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY– Experts consider salt marshes foot soldiers in the battle against climate change: In the U.S. Northeast alone, they sop up enough carbon every year
By Boris Tsand For most people, the mention of plastic pollution conjures up images of large garbage patches floating in the open ocean, thanks in part to the proliferation of such images on social media. The public’s preoccupation with these forms of pollution is mirrored in academia; studies in plastic pollution often focus on ocean
By Steven Withrow Human beings now have the technology to rewrite our genetic codes and the codes of every organism on Earth. What is more, this technology has been around for billions of years—bacteria naturally evolved it as a mechanism to fight off viral invaders—only to be discovered in the early 2000s by researchers working
By Eric Boodman You’ve swum with one, stepped on one, maybe swallowed one. This unsung invertebrate could teach us about aging WOODS HOLE, Mass. — In case you were wondering, Kristin Gribble is not a basher of fruit flies or roundworms. She wants to be clear: She bears no ill will toward those invertebrates so
By Jeanie Chung Margaret Gardel, the Horace B. Horton Professor in the Department of Physics [at the University of Chicago], found her area of study through a series of serendipitous events. Her graduate research at Harvard focused on filamentous actin, a polymer found within cells in multicellular organisms. In living cells actin drives cell motion
This is the latest discovery to emerge from the HHMI-MBL Summer Institute, a large, interdisciplinary collaboration held at the MBL between 2013-2017. By Peter Thorley University of Warwick Two proteins that act as a ‘clutch’ in cells to put them in gear and drive our immune response have been identified for the first time. A
Science Friday wrapped up its “eight-day squid-and-kin appreciation extravaganza,” Cephalopod Week, by interviewing MBL Hibbitt Fellow Carrie Albertin, who gives Ira Flatow “a tour of the complex genomes of octopuses, and how understanding cephalopod genetics could lead to greater insights into human health.” … Read more and hear broadcast … Source: Closing Out The Cephalo-Party
The Microbiome Center, a joint initiative of the MBL, the University of Chicago, and Argonne National Laboratory, has announced the successful applicants for its inaugural Pilot Projects Funding Call. The focus of these ~$20K grants is to provide seed monies for microbial research projects that will help investigators generate the data needed for larger funding
By Paul Caine University of Chicago paleontologist Neil Shubin takes us behind some of the most recent stories making headlines in the world of science. Stories include … Hydra revealed Researchers at the University of Chicago’s Marine Biological Laboratory and Columbia University believe they may have achieved a world first by mapping the full-body muscle
.entry-header By Johanna Mayer We wish could ask cephalopod scientists questions for eight days straight, but the next best thing is an hour-long reddit AMA. Roger Hanlon (of MBL), Louise Allcock, and Mike Vecchione are authors of Octopus, Squid, and Cuttlefish: A Visual, Scientific Guide to the Oceans’ Most Advanced Invertebrates—and they know a lot