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Biochemistry

Mibelle Biochemistry’s Ability to Introduce Breakthrough Active Ingredients for the Personal Care Market Lauded by Frost & Sullivan – PR Newswire…

The company's active ingredient product lines meet consumer expectations of quality, performance, and sustainability

LONDON, Nov. 18, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --Based on its recent analysis of the global personal care active ingredientsmarket, Frost & Sullivan recognizes Mibelle AG Biochemistry with the 2020 Global Company of the Year Award. It has successfully introduced several breakthrough sustainable active ingredients, whose efficacy is shttps://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1337466/Mibelle_Award.jpg upported by in-vivo and in-vitro study results. Mibelle is a pioneer with regards to using senolytics to delay skin aging in cosmetic applications, which has helped the company achieve a leading positioning in the market.

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"Demonstrating its expertise in recognizing the dynamic needs of the cosmetics industry, Mibelle launched the Alpine Rose Active line of products to fight skin aging,"said Prateeksha Kaul Research Analyst. "This line of products uses a natural senolytic agent extracted from the Alpine rose leaves in the Swiss Alps to eliminate senescent cells, which are the cells responsible for aging, without affecting the neighboring cells. This halts the skin's aging process while rejuvenating it and increasing its elasticity. This product also meets the rising demand for natural and sustainable products over harsh chemicals that are harmful to both the environment and the skin."

Similarly, in response to the growing interest in phytocannabinods, Mibelle introduced an encapsulated cannabidiol (CBD) product, the Lipobelle Pino C. Other players in the market have had limited success with CBD in spite of its potential benefits for the skin because it is not soluble in water. Mibelle addressed this limitation with the Lipobelle Pino C. By encapsulating the CBD into a nanoemulsion using hemp oil, Mibelle made it water-soluble and stable in cosmetic formulations. Its combination with an extract from Swiss stone pines also helps the product fight inflammation. Lipobelle Pino C exploits the anti-inflammatory and regenerating effects of CBD for cosmetic benefits such as easing facial tension, reducing inflammation, and regenerating tissue.

Mibelle has been a pioneer in utilizing interesting biochemical concepts for its active ingredients. In 2008, it gained a first-mover advantage with the launch of its active ingredient PhytoCellTec Malus Domestica, which involved the application of stem cells in cosmetics for the very first time. In 2019, Mibelle utilized its PhytoCellTec technology to launch the PhytoCellTec Goji, which stimulates the mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) culture with goji stem cells for enhancing face shape by preventing the skin from sagging. The success of this technology and other recent innovations has allowed the company to achieve a 15 percent growth rate annually.

"Mibelle works closely with certification bodies to analyze the ingredients, raw materials, and processes to obtain the required certifications for its products. It also collaborates with personal care product manufacturers to offer premium high-quality products that benefit the end user," noted Kaul. "With its ability to introduce breakthrough active ingredients, Mibelle AG Biochemistry has carved a niche for itself in the personal care industry. It has consistently adopted a holistic innovation approach that has enabled it to consistently develop novel concepts and ingredients."

Each year, Frost & Sullivan presents a Company of the Year award to the organization that demonstrates excellence in terms of growth strategy and implementation in its field. The award recognizes a high degree of innovation with products and technologies, and the resulting leadership in terms of customer value and market penetration.

Frost & Sullivan Best Practices awards recognize companies in a variety of regional and global markets for demonstrating outstanding achievement and superior performance in areas such as leadership, technological innovation, customer service, and strategic product development. Industry analysts compare market participants and measure performance through in-depth interviews, analysis, and extensive secondary research to identify best practices in the industry.

About Frost & Sullivan

For over five decades, Frost & Sullivan has become world-renowned for its role in helping investors, corporate leaders, and governments navigate economic changes and identify disruptive technologies, Mega Trends, new business models, and companies to action, resulting in a continuous flow of growth opportunities to drive future success. Contact us: Start the discussion.

Contact:

Harley GadomskiP: 12104778469E: [emailprotected]

About Mibelle AG Biochemistry

Mibelle Biochemistry designs and develops innovative, high-quality actives based on naturally derived compounds and profound scientific know-how. Inspired by nature - Realized by Science.

For more information on Mibelle Biochemistry, please visit http://www.mibellebiochemistry.com

Contact:

Esther Belser Mibelle Biochemistry, SwitzerlandHead of MarketingPhone: +41 62 836 13 47Email: [emailprotected]

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Mibelle Biochemistry's Ability to Introduce Breakthrough Active Ingredients for the Personal Care Market Lauded by Frost & Sullivan - PR Newswire...

Biochemistry

Clearing the Course for Glycans in Development of Flu Drugs – UC San Diego Health

Researchers demonstrate molecular binding mechanism that could change approach to designing influenza treatments

There is no hole-in-one drug treatment when it comes to the flu, but that doesnt stop scientists from trying to sink one. Especially since as many as one in five Americans gets the flu. The reported estimated cost of this illness is $10 billion each year in medical expenses and another $16 billion in lost earnings in America alone, according to researchers at UC San Diego.

Rommie Amaro, Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego.

Teeing up on the science behind the flu virus is Rommie Amaro and J. Andrew McCammon, both professors of chemistry and biochemistry, and graduate student Christian Seitz. Together with co-workers Lorenzo Casalino, Robert Konecny and Gary Huber, they studied the effect of glycansgroups of sugar moleculeson the binding of antiviral drugs to viral neuraminidase. An enzyme found on the surface of flu viruses, neuraminidase enables the viruses to exit their diseased host cells and infect and replicate in new, previously healthy host cells. The glycans help to prevent large antibody molecules from binding to the enzyme.

The researchers findings, published in Biophysical Journal, likely apply more generallyincluding to the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19. Amaro will soon be releasing new findings about her latest research on the virus spike protein.

According to the scientists, influenza neuraminidase is the target for three FDA-approved influenza drugs in the U.S., but drug resistance and low drug effectiveness merit more drug development. Generally, however, drug developers do not include glycans in their development pipelines. They know glycans exist, but they have ignored glycans when designing new drugs without a basis for doing so and without evidence that glycans do not affect drug binding.

With their focus on glycans, the team thought it would be prudent to test the assumption about glycans in drug design relative to neuraminidase. Their results show that their proposed binding mechanism can help shed light on the complexity of the interplay between glycans and ligand binding.

Traditionally, glycans have been difficult to study experimentally or theoretically due to a number of technological constraints, which are beginning to be lifted, explained Seitz, first author of the study. Because of this recent emergence of glycans, we still have a lot to learn about them.

The superposition of four glycan conformations onto the static neuraminidase structure shows the conformational variability of the glycans, partially blocking binding site access. Metaphorically, the glycans are the rocks on the mini-golf course and the binding sites are the holes. The glycans are in blue, red, green and gray; the binding sites are in purple and orange, and neuraminidase is in teal. This representation is simplified to emphasize the relationship between the glycans and the binding sites, showing half of the neuraminidase structure and less than one-fifth of the glycans present in the full study. Figure by Christian Seitz, Amaro Lab and McCammon Lab, UC San Diego.

To better understand glycans in the context of this particular study, the team created all-atom in silico systems of influenza neuraminidase, consisting of four different glycan configurations and one glycan-free system. They observed a two- to eight-fold decrease in the rate of ligand binding to the primary binding site of neuraminidase After examining neuraminidases binding sites, the scientists noted that drugs prefer the primary binding site over the secondary binding site.

Personally, I found two things to be quite surprising. Glycans are flexible and can reside very close to the drug binding sites, so I thought that the glycans would completely block drug binding. However, we found the glycans acted more like a screen or a curtainthings can get through, it will just take a bit longer, said Seitz. Secondly, there are two binding sites on influenza neuraminidase; one is the primary (catalytic) site needed for the viral replication cycle to continue, and the other, secondary site, is not well understood. Some previous studies had initially concluded that ligands would reach the secondary site significantly faster than the primary site.

Seitz noted that McCammon was the first person to run a molecular dynamics study with a protein, and the Brownian dynamics software used in this study was developed in his lab. Additionally, Amaro is known as a world-leading expert in molecular dynamics virus simulations, and her virus work has recently been covered in The New York Times.

Combining these rich basins of knowledge we are able to gain new insights into a global disease right here in San Diego, said Seitz.

The graduate student likened the study to a mini-golf course. We have the obvious goal of wanting to get the ball in the hole except, in our study, the golf ball is an influenza drug and the hole is the protein receptor the drug must find to kill the virus. One can often find large rocks on the greens acting as gatekeepers to make it more difficult to get the ball in the hole. In our flu analogy, these rocks are the tiny sugars called glycans.

Just as a groundskeeper can change the position of the rocks near the hole, glycans can change position on the protein. So, the researchers wanted to know if changing the position of the glycans would change how easy or difficult it is for the influenza drug to find its target.

To start, we found common positions of these glycans. However, just as you would not change the position of the rocks on a mini-golf course and do one putt before declaring it easier or harder, we knew we would have to repeat this process many times (600 million, actually) to reach a statistically significant conclusion. Each Brownian dynamics trajectory in our study represented one putt on our mini-golf course, and we simply measured if the ball reached the hole, Seitz explained.

The scientists found that changing the positions of the glycans did make it somewhat harder for the drug to reach the target, but not as much as expected. This means that drug developers do not need to account for glycans when designing new small-molecule drugs for influenzasomething that was unclear before.

For a long time, I thought this couldn't be true and ran numerous tests to disprove it, but all these tests consistently said the same thing, that most small ligands are able to evade the glycans and bind to the enzyme, Seitz said. Thus, this work is one small step in helping to ameliorate the yearly human and economic cost in our nation and our world. This is paid for by our own taxes so each of us has made a tiny contribution to this progress.

This research was supported in part by grants from the National Institutes of Health, USA (NIH grant nos. T32EB009380 and GM031749 and the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (grant no. DGE-1650112). The researchers used the Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE), which is supported by National Science Foundation (grant no. ACI-1548562) and the XSEDE Comet at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (allocation csd373).

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Clearing the Course for Glycans in Development of Flu Drugs - UC San Diego Health

Human Behavior

Infected again or endless COVID-19? How the ‘reinfection phenomenon’ could impact vaccines, herd immunity and human behavior – USA TODAY

A 25-year-old Nevada man was the first American confirmed to have caught COVID-19 twice, and his second infection was worse than the first. USA TODAY

By medical standards,Nicole Worthley is considered extraordinarily rare. She was diagnosed with COVID-19 on March 31 and again in September.

She was walloped both times, with a fever for six weeks and side effects all summer before round two kicked in.

But she can't prove she had COVID-19 twice. That requires genetic testing of both infections, which has only happened a few dozen times in the world, and never in South Dakota where she lives.

Many states are keeping track of claims of reinfection South Dakota, for example, is studying at least 28, while Washington state is investigating 120 but they are still considered extremely unusual, according to health experts, including the World Health Organization.

In Colorado, 241 people have had a second positive PCR test more than 90 days after the first one. "All are investigated as cases, including isolation instruction for the case and quarantine instruction for their close contacts," according to a Colorado Department of Health and Environment spokesperson.

There may be a COVID-19 vaccine by the end of the year. But 'normality' may not come until the end of 2021

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a statement that it is investigating some possible reinfections but has not yet confirmed any. It only considers infections more than 90 days apart to be possible reinfections; otherwise, someone's illness is likely a lingering infection.

Worthley said she's not sure which is worse: Being able to be reinfected, or having a lingering virus that could flare up anytime.

Nicole Worthley believes s he's been infected twice with COVID-19, forcing herself and three kids, ages 6, 8 and 10, to isolate at home for months.(Photo: Courtesy Nicole Worthley)

"Whether or not I personally have a proven reinfection isn't to me as important as it's possible that you can get it again," she said. "Or, if you don't believe that, then it's possible that for six straight months you can have COVID-19, still test positive for COVID-19 and still be actively ill from it because I don't think there's a lot of understanding of that right now."

No one knows how long the immune system can keep someone safe from COVID-19 after infection.

Some diseases like measles are one and done. Once a person is infected or vaccinated, the immune system typically provides protection forever. With other viruses, like the common coldsome of which are closely related to the coronavirus that causes COVID-19protection might not last a year, or even a season.

COVID-19 was discovered less than a year ago, so scientists don't yet know how long the body can fight it off.

The answer has implications for the longevity and effectiveness of vaccines, the possibility of communities developing so-called herd immunitywhere the virus no longer spreads because so many people have already been infected, and how those infected once should feel and behave.

Worthley, 37, could be considered a "long-hauler"someone whose COVID-19 lasted for months after infection.

She was diagnosed on March 31 after suffering sharp chest pains. A few days later, she was so short of breath thatshe could barely walk across her apartment.

A single parent to three kids, ages 6, 8 and 10, Worthley struggled to function. "The room would be spinning and I'd be wheezing and stuff. Sometimes I could feel my teeth tingling," she said.

She had a fever for four straight weeks, then had a break for a day or sonot enough to meet the 72-hour window to be declared healthy and then spiked again for two more weeks.

She and her kids were stuck in their Sioux Falls apartment from late March until early June.

Cold weather, holiday visitors and pandemic fatigue: Experts warn COVID-19 will get much worse this winter

The children never got more than a few tired days and a yucky cough. But she knows her illness affected them. During his bedtime prayers, her oldest son often said he was thankful she was still alive.

In early June, the family was finally allowed to go out. Worthley was told she didn't need another test; she was no longer considered infectious.

She went back to work at the day care center where she's an assistant teacher but only part time because the pandemic had driven away some families.

Still, all summer, Worthley, previously healthy though admittedly overweight, had weird symptoms. Her doctor prescribed a beta blocker for heart palpitations and an anticonvulsant for nerve pain in her legs.

She donated convalescent plasma in September, hoping the antibodies her immune system had developed could help someone else fight off COVID-19.

Nicole Worthley had a fever for six weeks during her first bout with COVID-19, but "only" 17 days with her second.(Photo: Nicole Worthley)

Then, at the end of September, about a month after her kids started in-person school, her 10-year-old came down with strep.

Worthley was feeling lousy, too, so she got tested for strep. Negative.

A few days later, still feeling weak, she called her doctor. Can you smell anything, the doctor asked.

"I got the Vicks out," Worthley said. Nothing.

Four days later, she got a positive COVID-19 test result.

"It was easier this time," she said. "I was only feverish for 17 days."

She had diarrhea, upset stomach, loss of taste and some respiratory issues, but not as bad as the first infection. More than a month later, though, she still can't smell and a half-hour phone call was punctuated with her coughs.

Worthley believes she is among the 28 people that the South Dakota Department of Health has said it's investigating for reinfection, although she's yet to hear from anyone at the state.

So far, only a few dozen people worldwide have been confirmed to have been infected twice with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

One man in Hong Kong didn't know he'd been infected a second time. He only found out when he was routinely tested on his return home from a trip to Italy. Another man, just 25, in Nevada, was sicker the second time.

In both cases, genetic analysis of the infections proved that they were infected twice, with slightly different versions of the virus not just long-suffering. The WHO has received reports of reinfections, but they are relatively rare so far.

"Our current understanding of the immune response is that the majority of people who are infected mount an immune response within a few weeks of infection," a WHO spokesman said via email. "We are still learning about how long the antibodies last. So far, we have data that shows that the immune response lasts for several months."

In a statement, a CDC spokesperson said the agency is actively investigating a number of suspected cases of reinfection, though none has been confirmed.

"CDCs investigation of the reinfection phenomenon is in its early stages," he said.

'Pleasantly surprised': Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine candidate shown to be 90% effective in early findings

Jeffrey Shaman, a professor at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, who has been investigating reinfections, said scientists still have a lot of open questions.

Among other things, he said, they want to know: How often reinfection can happen, are people contagious with the second infection and for how long, and do people who are reinfected have less severe cases the second time or are they worse off?

To answer those questions, researchers like him have to figure out what's behind these reinfections, Shaman said.

People might fail to generate immune memory with the first infection, and need repeated exposure to build up immunity. If so, a vaccine might have the same problem, and it won't bevery effective.

Or people might get antibodies to the virus and then lose them, Shaman said. In that case, a vaccine's benefit might not last long.

The worst-case scenario would be what happens with dengue.In the case of that mosquito-borne tropical disease,someone can get sicker if infected a second time, or infected after getting a vaccine.Then, a vaccine could actually be harmful though theres no evidence thats the case with COVID-19.

Sometimes diseases that start as outbreaks can become endemic, returning year after year.

The 1918 flu, for instance, was so devastating because it was new and no one had built up resistance, Shaman said. It came back repeatedly but "didn't have the huge pulses of people dying," he said, possibly because their bodies had built up some immunity to it.

If that's the case with COVID-19, then a vaccine, even a partially effective one, could have a big benefit by exposing people to the virus and helping them build up a tolerance, he said.

It's not yet clear how long someone is contagious with COVID-19 if their symptoms linger or recur.

A study published Thursday in JAMA Internal Medicinefound that 18% of COVID-19 patients in an Italian hospital tested positive again after recovering from symptoms and having a negative test.

Only 1 of the 32 patients tested showed signs of replicating virus in their bloodstream, suggesting that they were either still infectious or reinfected but that couldn't be confirmed because no genetic testing was done. That patient was still suffering symptoms 39 days after the initial diagnosis, though the others who tested positive again were unlikely to be contagious, the study concluded.

Until scientists learn the answers to these questions, people who have been infected once shouldn't assume they're protected indefinitely, and should continue to wear masks, wash hands, maintain distance and avoid crowds, Shaman said.

"The only way we're going to get a sense of it is over time," he said.

Worthley admits she could have been more careful about wearing a mask. When she first caught COVID-19 in March, few people were wearing them, and Worthley didn't know of anyone at church, work, her kids' schools who had COVID-19.

In the summer and early fall, she wore a mask at work, but not at church. She assumed she'd be protected because she'd been sick for so long.

Now, Worthleysaid she's not confident of being protected against the virus, so she always wears a mask.

"I have a whole bunch of them in my van," she said.

Contact Karen Weintraub at kweintraub@usatoday.com.

Health and patient safety coverage at USA TODAY is made possible in part by a grant from the Masimo Foundation for Ethics, Innovation and Competition in Healthcare. The Masimo Foundation does not provide editorial input.

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Human Behavior

4-OCEANS Project: Assessing the Importance of Marine Life to Human Societies – SciTechDaily

Two researchers from Trinity College Dublin are among a four-strong team of principal investigators spearheading a new 10.4 million project funded by the European Research Council (ERC) to assess the importance of marine life to human societies during the last two millennia, with a focus on understanding the consequences of marine resource exploitation for societal development.

The project, 4-OCEANS, has been funded via an ERC Synergy Grant. These highly prestigious grants support transformative work that addresses major research challenges that would fall beyond the scope of any single ERC award and can only be tackled by collaborative approaches spanning multiple disciplines.

This project will bring together leaders with expertise in marine environmental history, climate history, natural history, geography, historical ecology, and zooarchaeology, nurturing a unique collaboration and integration of researchers from the humanities, natural sciences, and social sciences.

Professor Poul Holm, Trinity College Dublin, talks about the 4-OCEANS project. Credit: Trinity College Dublin

The 4-OCEANS team is comprised of principal investigators, Poul Holm, Professor of Environmental History, and Francis Ludlow, Assistant Professor of Medieval Environmental History, from Trinity; James H Barrett, Reader in Medieval Archaeology and Deputy Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at the University of Cambridge; and Cristina Brito, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Social and Human Sciences and the Deputy Director of CHAM Centre for the Humanities, at NOVA University Lisbon.

Professor Holm said:

We are excited to have secured this grant to embark on a fascinating and important project that will provide us with an unparalleled understanding of humanitys recent interactions with the oceans, which will likely inform future symbioses with the many, varied aspects of marine ecosystems that enrich and support us.

Specifically, combining history and archaeology with marine science and socioeconomics, the 4-OCEANS team will examine when and where marine exploitation was of significance to human society; how selected major socio-economic, cultural, and environmental forces variously constrained and enabled marine exploitation; and what were the consequences of marine resource exploitation for societal development.

Professor Ludlow added:

There are many avenues of research that we look forward to pursuing, but the most important goal of the project is to conduct the first-ever globalized evaluation of the role of marine resources for societal development across two millennia, and thereby advance our understanding of the role of ocean life in human history.

Long-term data and an understanding of changes in ecosystems and human behavior over many centuries is critical to informing the continued development of the UNs Sustainable Development Goals and the Decade for the Oceans, from which the historical dimension is still missing. The 4-OCEANS project will ultimately introduce much-needed chronological depth to how we view urgent societal and environmental issues across the globe, through the understanding of our past.

Dr. Barrett said:

By combining archaeology, history and environmental science we aim to map, date, and measure past harvests of marine life. Untangling human and natural drivers, 4-OCEANS will explain how diverse historical trajectories created global networks, fuelling major centers with the products of distant ecosystems with lasting consequences for both societies and the sea.

Professor Brito added: The project 4-OCEANS will deepen our understanding of the oceans past and the relationships that different human societies established with this environment and their resources, helping to bridge the gap in knowledge about and the emotional connection of people with the oceans. By addressing the human history of marine life, our interdisciplinary research will emphasize the importance and value of the humanities for the study of the ocean and address current environmental and societal issues.

Professors Holm and Ludlow will oversee 5.4 million of the 10.4 million research funding total allocated to 4-OCEANS. Over the course of H2020, Trinity researchers have secured 37 ERC Investigator grants to date (valued at approximately 68 million), which equates to around 50% of all H2020 ERC awards in Ireland.

Dr. Patrick Prendergast, Provost of Trinity, said:

Synergy Grants are regarded as the most competitive of the ERCs awards, all of which are awarded on the basis of research excellence. We are very proud of Poul and Francis success in this regard and are particularly pleased that they will form a unique collaboration that brings together world-leaders in multiple disciplines spanning the humanities, natural, and social sciences. We look forward to tracking the progress of the 4-OCEANS project, and the many important and varied contributions it promises to make.

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4-OCEANS is Professor Holms second ERC award after his ERC Advanced Grant NorFish: North Atlantic Fisheries: An Environmental History, 1400-1700, while Professors Ludlow, Barrett, and Brito were also all previously funded under the Excellence Pillar of H2020 through Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA).

Professor Ludlow received an MSCA Individual Fellowship before going on to win an Irish Research Council Starting Laureate Award for his project CLICAB: Climates of Conflict in Ancient Babylonia.

Dr. Barrett, who led pioneering work on the incorporation of scientific methodologies into humanistic research, is a co-leader of the MSCA International Doctoral Training Network SeaChanges: Thresholds in human exploitation of marine vertebrates.

Professor Brito, coordinator of the UNESCO Chair on Oceans Cultural Heritage, is also the coordinator of the MSCA Research and Innovation Staff Exchange project CONCHA: The construction of early modern global Cities and oceanic networks in the Atlantic: An approach via OceaNs Cultural HeritAge (2018-2021).

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4-OCEANS Project: Assessing the Importance of Marine Life to Human Societies - SciTechDaily

Cell Biology

New Organic Compounds Discovered That Could Have Helped Form the First Cells – Lab Manager Magazine

Drying, followed by rehydration, of a glycolide/glycine mixed monomer solution results in polymers which self-assemble into macromolecular aggregates, as observed by light microscopy.

Jim Cleaves, ELSI

Chemists studying how life started often focus on how modern biopolymers like peptides and nucleic acids contributed, but modern biopolymers don't form easily without help from living organisms. A possible solution to this paradox is that life started using different components, and many non-biological chemicals were likely abundant in the environment. A new survey conducted by an international team of chemists from the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology and other institutes from Malaysia, the Czech Republic, the US, and India, has found that a diverse set of such compounds easily form polymers under primitive environmental conditions, and some even spontaneously form cell-like structures.

Understanding how life started on Earth is one of the most challenging questions modern science attempts to explain. Scientists presently study modern organisms and try to see what aspects of their biochemistry are universal, and thus were probably present in the organisms from which they descended. The best guess is that life has thrived on Earth for at least 3.5 billion of Earth's 4.5 billion year history since the planet formed, and most scientists would say life likely began before there is good evidence for its existence. Problematically, since Earth's surface is dynamic, the earliest traces of life on Earth have not been preserved in the geological record. However, the earliest evidence for life on Earth tells us little about what the earliest organisms were made of, or what was going on inside their cells. "There is clearly a lot left to learn from prebiotic chemistry about how life may have arisen," says the study's co-author Jim Cleaves.

A hallmark of life is evolution, and the mechanisms of evolution suggest that common traits can suddenly be displaced by rare and novel mutations which allow mutant organisms to survive better and proliferate, often replacing previously common organisms very rapidly. Paleontological, ecological, and laboratory evidence suggests this occurs commonly and quickly. One example is an invasive organism like the dandelion, which was introduced to the Americas from Europe and is now a common weed causing lawn-concerned homeowners to spend countless hours of effort and dollars to eradicate. Another less whimsical example is COVID-19, a virus (technically not living, but technically an organism) which was probably confined to a small population of bats for years, but suddenly spread among humans around the world. Organisms which reproduce faster than their competitors, even only slightly faster, quickly send their competitors to what Leon Trotsky termed the "ash heap of history." As most organisms which have ever existed are extinct, co-author Tony Z. Jia suggests that "to understand how modern biology emerged, it is important to study plausible non-biological chemistries or structures not currently present in modern biology which potentially went extinct as life complexified."

This idea of evolutionary replacement is pushed to an extreme when scientists try to understand the origins of life. All modern organisms have a few core commonalities: all life is cellular, life uses DNA as an information storage molecule, and uses DNA to make ribonucleic RNA as an intermediary way to make proteins. Proteins perform most of the catalysis in modern biochemistry, and they are created using a very nearly universal "code" to make them from RNA. How this code came to be is in itself enigmatic, but these deep questions point to their possibly having been a very murky period in early biological evolution ~ 4 billion years ago during which almost none of the molecular features observed in modern biochemistry were present, and few if any of the ones that were present have been carried forward.

A new study by scholars based at the Earth-Life Science Institute at Tokyo Institute of Technology showed that non-biological chemicals produce polymers and cell-like structures under primitive Earth-like settings.

Kuhan Chandru

Proteins are linear polymers of amino acids. These floppy strings of polymerized amino acids fold into unique three-dimensional shapes, forming extremely efficient catalysts which foster precise chemical reactions. In principle, many types of polymerized molecules could form similar strings and fold to form similar catalytic shapes, and synthetic chemists have already discovered many examples. "The point of this kind of study is finding functional polymers in plausibly prebiotic systems without the assistance of biology, including grad students," says co-author Irena Mamajanov.

Scientists have found many ways to make biological organic compounds without the intervention of biology, and these mechanisms help explain these compounds' presence in samples like carbonaceous meteorites, which are relics of the early solar system, and which scientists don't think ever hosted life. These primordial meteorite samples also contain many other types of molecules which could have formed complex folded polymers like proteins, which could have helped steer primitive chemistry. Proteins, by virtue of their folding and catalysis mediate much of the complex biochemical evolution observed in living systems. The ELSI team reasoned that alternative polymers could have helped this occur before the coding between DNA and protein evolved. "Perhaps we cannot reverse-engineer the origin of life; it may be more productive to try and build it from scratch, and not necessarily using modern biomolecules. There were large reservoirs of non-biological chemicals that existed on the primeval Earth. How they helped in the formation of life-as-we-know-it is what we are interested in," says co-author Kuhan Chandru.

The ELSI team did something simple yet profound: they took a large set of structurally diverse small organic molecules which could plausibly be made by prebiotic processes and tried to see if they could form polymers when evaporated from dilute solution. To their surprise, they found many of the primitive compounds could, though they also found some of them decomposed rapidly. This simple criterion, whether a compound is able to be dried without decomposing, may have been one of the earliest evolutionary selection pressures for primordial molecules.

The team conducted one further simple test. They took these dried reactions, added water, and looked at them under a microscope. To their surprise, some of the products of these reaction formed cell-sized compartments. That simple starting materials containing 10 to 20 atoms can be converted to self-organized cell-like aggregates containing millions of atoms provides startling insight into how simple chemistry may have led to complex chemistry bordering on the kind of complexity associated with living systems, while not using modern biochemicals.

"We didn't test every possible compound, but we tested a lot of possible compounds. The diversity of chemical behaviors we found was surprising, and suggests this kind of small-molecule to functional-aggregate behavior is a common feature of organic chemistry, which may make the origin of life a more common phenomenon than previously thought," concludes co-author Niraja Bapat.

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New Organic Compounds Discovered That Could Have Helped Form the First Cells - Lab Manager Magazine

Human Behavior

World Savings Day: Save a bit, big things will follow – Anadolu Agency

ANKARA

Celebrated for nearly a century to help raise public awareness on the importance of saving money both for modern economies across the globe and individuals alike, World Savings Day on Saturday promises that even the smallest frugality can yield substantial benefits in the future.

Also known as World Thrift Day, the Oct. 31 event seeks to promote the virtue of wise spending, as well as saving money in banks, rather than keeping it under the mattress and out of the economy, according to the World Savings and Retail Banking Institute.

Saving is vital to make welfare sustainable, and this habit should be cemented from an early age to help men and women prevent economic hardship and build bright futures for themselves and their families.

"When you save a bit, big things follow," will be the theme of this year's event slated for Oct. 31, suggesting that a penny saved can become multiple pennies earned in the long run if invested in the right place.

Especially amid the economic consequences of the ongoing pandemic, people all over the world have once again witnessed how vital it is to save as hundreds of thousands lose their jobs due to the virus-driven crisis.

This period can also be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for financial consolidation as so many money-spending venues and activities have shut down, which would increase staying power in future turbulence.

It is often stated that human behavior -- including spending -- is motivated by surroundings, and physical shopping, for instance, is one of these behaviors.

The pandemic has obviously altered this environment, since people now spend a greater portion of their time at home rather than in stores or shopping malls, leading to less consumption.

Many are hoping that this new way of living will help people develop better habits, such as saving and spending wisely.

History of World Savings Day

World Savings Day was celebrated on Oct. 31, 1924, during the first International Savings Bank Congress (World Society of Savings Banks) in Milan, Italy.

Italian Professor Filippo Ravizza declared this day "International Savings Day" on the last day of the congress.

There had been other examples in history of days dedicated to saving money for a higher standard of living and a more durable economy.

Spain, had named the first national thrift day on record in 1921. Meanwhile in Germany, confidence in saving had to be revived after many lost their nearly all they owned in the monetary reform of 1923.

Following the Second World War, World Thrift Day continued and reached its peak of popularity between 1955 and 1970.

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World Savings Day: Save a bit, big things will follow - Anadolu Agency

Human Behavior

What Is the Study of Human Behavior? | National University

Consider these scenarios: an office with under-motivated employees is struggling to maintain team momentum, an ex-offender is trying to get a new start, a young manager is experiencing difficulties with leadership, a community is in need of a program to encourage healthy behavior in teens, a nonprofit organization is trying to craft a philanthropic appeal. These are all situations in which a specialist in human behavior can make a real impact.

Ask twenty people their definition of the study of human behavior and youre likely to get as many different answers. Some consider it a soft skill on par with observation and intuition. Others would define it as an academic pursuit akin to anthropology and sociology. Still others would equate it with psychology and human motivations. The fascinating part of human behavior studies is that it incorporates all of these aspects and more.

Anyone engaged in the study and practice of human behavioral sciences can expect to be involved in a field touching many areas of the applied and social sciences. Professionals and students can expect to work one-on-one with individuals and in complex group situations. They have the option to work in settings ranging from offices to nonprofits to educational institutions. The professions associated with human behavior studies are growing and opportunities abound.

What is the study of human behavior? This diverse field involves the research and practical application of how individuals interact and work with one another, and how groups operate. Strongly rooted in psychology and sociology, studies of human behavior give us an academic understanding of motivations, productivity, and how teams work. In turn, these insights can help make workplaces or any group setting more productive.

Professor Charles Tatum of the Department of Psychology at National University has spent his career in the fields of cognitive psychology and industrial and organizational psychology. He sees human behavior as deeply rooted in biology, experience, and culture. Understanding these motivations and influences, he feels, is key to developing systems that can positively impact productivity and success in workplace and group settings.

Were deeply influenced by both biology and environment, he explains. Its the interaction of the two. Two people with similar characteristics will end up very differently depending on where they grow up. Look at temperament; thats a biological factor. Someone with a low frustration point may find themselves doing poorly in school and end up turning to crime. That same temperament, in another environment, might have a totally different outcome. If channeled into sports, for instance, it can even be beneficial.

The influence of environment becomes even more profound when looking at differences across cultures and societies. The norms associated with child rearing, ethics, and religion all add layers of complexity to the study of human behavior. In many societies, the advent of the internet, digital technologies, and mobile devices are changing the landscape of human behaviors.

Dr. Tatum feels that smartphones and the constant need to post or respond to messages have led to more people being distracted. People think they can effectively multitask. Just look at people checking phones in their cars. But research shows that people lose effectiveness when constantly multitasking. The internet has helped us gain access to any information needed but, ironically, made us less productive.

Human behavior-related fields have branched into several distinct areas based on populations served and outcomes. Often, those pursuing study in this field will be trained as a psychologist. However, while the field of psychology is typically associated with clinical counseling, studies of human behavior expand beyond individual treatment into areas of applied research, ethics, sexuality, and adult development. Students pursuing a masters-level program related to human behavior studies will be immersed in a broad range of topics, taking classes in personal and professional ethics, personal growth and communication, organizational behaviors, behavioral change theory, leadership, behavioral research, and many others. The goal of covering such a range of subjects related to human behavior is a well-rounded education covering aspects of individual and group dynamics. Training and education vary by specialty.

Human behavior studies are applicable to many career opportunities including academia, community service, human resources and employee assistance programs, government, philanthropic work and probation, and parole officers to name just a few.

Salaries will vary widely depending on location and in the career field you choose to apply your skills. As one example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projects the job outlook for human resources managers to grow 9 percent from 2016 to 2026. According to the BLS, the median wage for HR managers stood at $110,120 in 2017. In California, which has one of the highest levels of employment in this occupation, the median wage was $139,860.

The BLS projects the job outlook for probation officers to grow 6 percent from 2016 to 2026. These professionals had a median wage of $51,410 nationally in 2017, while the median wage in the state of California, another top employer in this profession, stood at $84,870.

National University offers both an on-campus and online degree program related to the study of human behavior.

The Master of Arts in Human Behavior is designed for students to acquire greater knowledge of the behavioral sciences and theories of human behavior. The degree coursework explores a wide array of behavioral topics covering personal, social, and organizational issues. The program is intended for students who have specific ambitions in the fields of supervision, management, and administration, but will also benefit students undergoing life transitions, seeking personal or career growth or requiring preparation for doctoral-level training. You can learn more about National Universitys Master of Arts in Human Behavior on our program page.

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What Is the Study of Human Behavior? | National University

Cell Biology

Touch and taste? Its all in the suckers – ScienceBlog.com

We think because the molecules do not solubilize well, they could, for instance, be found on the surface of octopuses prey and [whatever the animals touch], saidNicholas Bellono, an assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology and the studys senior author. So, when the octopus touches a rock versus a crab, now its arm knows, OK, Im touching a crab [because] I know theres not only touch but theres also this sort of taste.

In addition, scientists found diversity in what the receptors responded to and the signals they then transmitted to the cell and nervous systems.

We think that this is important because it could facilitate complexity in what the octopus senses and also how it can process a range of signals using its semi-autonomous arm nervous system to produce complex behaviors, Bellono said.

The scientists believe this research can help uncover similar receptor systems in other cephalopods, the invertebrate family that also includes squids and cuttlefish. The hope is to determine how these systems work on a molecular level and answer some relatively unexplored questions about how these creatures capabilities evolved to suit their environment.

Not much is known about marine chemotactile behavior and with this receptor family as a model system, we can now study which signals are important for the animal and how they can be encoded, saidLena van Giesen, a postdoctoral fellow in theBellono Laband lead author of the paper. These insights into protein evolution and signal coding go far beyond just cephalopods.

Along with Giesen, other co-authors from the lab includePeter B. Kilian, an animal technician, andCorey A.H. Allard, a postdoctoral fellow.

The strategies they have evolved in order to solve problems in their environment are unique to them and that inspires a great deal of interest from both scientists and non-scientists alike, Kilian said. People are drawn to octopuses and other cephalopods because they are wildly different from most other animals.

The team set out to uncover how the receptors are able to sense chemicals and detect signals in what they touch, like an arm around a snail, to help them make choices.

Octopus arms are distinct and complex. About two-thirds of an octopuss neurons are located in their arms. Because the arms operate partially independently from the brain, if one is severed it can still reach for, identify, and grasp items.

People are drawn to octopuses and other cephalopods because they are wildly different from most other animals.

Peter B. Kilian

The team started by identifying which cells in the suckers actually do the detecting. After isolating and cloning the touch and chemical receptors, they inserted them in frog eggs and in human cell lines to study their function in isolation. Nothing like these receptors exists in frog or human cells, so the cells act essentially like closed vessels for the study of these receptors.

The researchers then exposed those cells to molecules such as extracts from octopus prey and others items to which these receptors are known to react. Some test subjects were water-soluble, like salts, sugars, amino acids; others do not dissolve well and are not typically considered of interest by aquatic animals. Surprisingly, only the poorly soluble molecules activated the receptors.

Researchers then went back to the octopuses in their lab to see whether they too responded to those molecules by putting those same extracts on the floors of their tanks. They found the only odorants the octopuses receptors responded to were a non-dissolving class of naturally occurring chemicals known as terpenoid molecules.

[The octopus] was highly responsive to only the part of the floor that had the molecule infused, Bellono said. This led the researchers to believe that the receptors they identified pick up on these types of molecules and help the octopus distinguish what its touching. With the semi-autonomous nervous system, it can quickly make this decision: Do I contract and grab this crab or keep searching?

While the study provides a molecular explanation for this aquatic touch-taste sensation in octopuses through their chemotactile receptors, the researchers suggest further study is needed, given that a great number of unknown natural compounds could also stimulate these receptors to mediate complex behaviors.

Were now trying to look at other natural molecules that these animals might detect, Bellono said.

This research was supported by the New York Stem Cell Foundation, the Searle Scholars Program, the Sloan Foundation, the Klingenstein-Simons Fellowship, the National Institutes of Health, and the Swiss National Science Foundation.

Read more:
Touch and taste? Its all in the suckers - ScienceBlog.com

Cell Biology

Touch and Taste? It’s All in The Octopus Tentacles – Technology Networks

Octopuses have captured the human imagination for centuries, inspiring sagas of sea monsters from Scandinavian kraken legends to TV's "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" and, most recently, Netflix's less-threatening "My Octopus Teacher." With their eight suction-cup covered tentacles, their very appearance is unique, and their ability to use those appendages to touch and taste while foraging further sets them apart.

In fact, scientists have wondered for decades how those arms, or more specifically the suction cups on them, do their work, prompting a number of experiments into the biomechanics. But very few have studied what is happening on a molecular level. In a new report, Harvard researchers got a glimpse into how the nervous system in the octopus' arms (which operate largely independently from its centralized brain) manage this feat.

The work published Thursday in Cell.

The scientists identified a novel family of sensors in the first layer of cells inside the suction cups that have adapted to react and detect molecules that don't dissolve well in water. The research suggests these sensors, called chemotactile receptors, use these molecules to help the animal figure out what it's touching and whether that object is prey.

"We think because the molecules do not solubilize well, they could, for instance, be found on the surface of octopuses' prey and [whatever the animals touch]," said Nicholas Bellono, an assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology and the study's senior author. "So, when the octopus touches a rock versus a crab, now its arm knows, 'OK, I'm touching a crab [because] I know there's not only touch but there's also this sort of taste.'"

In addition, scientists found diversity in what the receptors responded to and the signals they then transmitted to the cell and nervous systems.

"We think that this is important because it could facilitate complexity in what the octopus senses and also how it can process a range of signals using its semi-autonomous arm nervous system to produce complex behaviors," Bellono said.

The scientists believe this research can help uncover similar receptor systems in other cephalopods, the invertebrate family that also includes squids and cuttlefish. The hope is to determine how these systems work on a molecular level and answer some relatively unexplored questions about how these creatures' capabilities evolved to suit their environment.

"Not much is known about marine chemotactile behavior and with this receptor family as a model system, we can now study which signals are important for the animal and how they can be encoded," said Lena van Giesen, a postdoctoral fellow in the Bellono Lab and lead author of the paper. "These insights into protein evolution and signal coding go far beyond just cephalopods."

Along with Giesen, other co-authors from the lab include Peter B. Kilian, an animal technician, and Corey A.H. Allard, a postdoctoral fellow.

"The strategies they have evolved in order to solve problems in their environment are unique to them and that inspires a great deal of interest from both scientists and non-scientists alike," Kilian said. "People are drawn to octopuses and other cephalopods because they are wildly different from most other animals."

The team set out to uncover how the receptors are able to sense chemicals and detect signals in what they touch, like a tentacle around a snail, to help them make choices.

Octopus arms are distinct and complex. About two-thirds of an octopus's neurons are located in their arms. Because the arms operate partially independently from the brain, if one is severed it can still reach for, identify, and grasp items.

The team started by identifying which cells in the suckers actually do the detecting. After isolating and cloning the touch and chemical receptors, they inserted them in frog eggs and in human cell lines to study their function in isolation. Nothing like these receptors exists in frog or human cells, so the cells act essentially like closed vessels for the study of these receptors.

The researchers then exposed those cells to molecules such as extracts from octopus prey and others items to which these receptors are known to react. Some test subjects were water-soluble, like salts, sugars, amino acids; others do not dissolve well and are not typically considered of interest by aquatic animals. Surprisingly, only the poorly soluble molecules activated the receptors.

Researchers then went back to the octopuses in their lab to see whether they too responded to those molecules by putting those same extracts on the floors of their tanks. They found the only odorants the octopuses receptors responded to were a non-dissolving class of naturally occurring chemicals known as terpenoid molecules.

"[The octopus] was highly responsive to only the part of the floor that had the molecule infused," Bellono said. This led the researchers to believe that the receptors they identified pick up on these types of molecules and help the octopus distinguish what it's touching. "With the semi-autonomous nervous system, it can quickly make this decision: 'Do I contract and grab this crab or keep searching?'"

While the study provides a molecular explanation for this aquatic touch-taste sensation in octopuses through their chemotactile receptors, the researchers suggest further study is needed, given that a great number of unknown natural compounds could also stimulate these receptors to mediate complex behaviors.

"We're now trying to look at other natural molecules that these animals might detect," Bellono said.

This research was supported by the New York Stem Cell Foundation, the Searle Scholars Program, the Sloan Foundation, the Klingenstein-Simons Fellowship, the National Institutes of Health, and the Swiss National Science Foundation.

Reference:

Lena van Giesen. Corey A.H. Allard Nicholas W. et al. Molecular basis of chemotactile sensation in octopus. Cell, 2020 DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2020.09.008

This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

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Touch and Taste? It's All in The Octopus Tentacles - Technology Networks

Cell Biology

Scientists discover new organic compounds that could have helped form the first cells – Newswise

Newswise Chemists studying how life started often focus on how modern biopolymers like peptides and nucleic acids contributed, but modern biopolymers don't form easily without help from living organisms. A possible solution to this paradox is that life started using different components, and many non-biological chemicals were likely abundant in the environment. A new survey conducted by an international team of chemists from the Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI) at Tokyo Institute of Technology and other institutes from Malaysia, the Czech Republic, the US and India, has found that a diverse set of such compounds easily form polymers under primitive environmental conditions, and some even spontaneously form cell-like structures.

Understanding how life started on Earth is one of the most challenging questions modern science attempts to explain. Scientists presently study modern organisms and try to see what aspects of their biochemistry are universal, and thus were probably present in the organisms from which they descended. The best guess is that life has thrived on Earth for at least 3.5 billion of Earth's 4.5 billion year history since the planet formed, and most scientists would say life likely began before there is good evidence for its existence. Problematically, since Earth's surface is dynamic, the earliest traces of life on Earth have not been preserved in the geological record. However, the earliest evidence for life on Earth tells us little about what the earliest organisms were made of, or what was going on inside their cells. "There is clearly a lot left to learn from prebiotic chemistry about how life may have arisen," says the study's co-author Jim Cleaves.

A hallmark of life is evolution, and the mechanisms of evolution suggest that common traits can suddenly be displaced by rare and novel mutations which allow mutant organisms to survive better and proliferate, often replacing previously common organisms very rapidly. Paleontological, ecological and laboratory evidence suggests this occurs commonly and quickly. One example is an invasive organism like the dandelion, which was introduced to the Americas from Europe and is now a common weed causing lawn-concerned homeowners to spend countless hours of effort and dollars to eradicate. Another less whimsical example is COVID-19, a virus (technically not living, but technically an organism) which was probably confined to a small population of bats for years, but suddenly spread among humans around the world. Organisms which reproduce faster than their competitors, even only slightly faster, quickly send their competitors to what Leon Trotsky termed the "ash heap of history." As most organisms which have ever existed are extinct, co-author Tony Z. Jia suggests that "to understand how modern biology emerged, it is important to study plausible non-biological chemistries or structures not currently present in modern biology which potentially went extinct as life complexified."

This idea of evolutionary replacement is pushed to an extreme when scientists try to understand the origins of life. All modern organisms have a few core commonalities: all life is cellular, life uses DNA as an information storage molecule, and uses DNA to make ribonucleic RNA as an intermediary way to make proteins. Proteins perform most of the catalysis in modern biochemistry, and they are created using a very nearly universal "code" to make them from RNA. How this code came to be is in itself enigmatic, but these deep questions point to their possibly having been a very murky period in early biological evolution ~ 4 billion years ago during which almost none of the molecular features observed in modern biochemistry were present, and few if any of the ones that were present have been carried forward.

Proteins are linear polymers of amino acids. These floppy strings of polymerised amino acids fold into unique three-dimensional shapes, forming extremely efficient catalysts which foster precise chemical reactions. In principle, many types of polymerised molecules could form similar strings and fold to form similar catalytic shapes, and synthetic chemists have already discovered many examples. "The point of this kind of study is finding functional polymers in plausibly prebiotic systems without the assistance of biology, including grad students," says co-author Irena Mamajanov.

Scientists have found many ways to make biological organic compounds without the intervention of biology, and these mechanisms help explain these compounds' presence in samples like carbonaceous meteorites, which are relics of the early solar system, and which scientists don't think ever hosted life. These primordial meteorite samples also contain many other types of molecules which could have formed complex folded polymers like proteins, which could have helped steer primitive chemistry. Proteins, by virtue of their folding and catalysis mediate much of the complex biochemical evolution observed in living systems. The ELSI team reasoned that alternative polymers could have helped this occur before the coding between DNA and protein evolved. "Perhaps we cannot reverse-engineer the origin of life; it may be more productive to try and build it from scratch, and not necessarily using modern biomolecules. There were large reservoirs of non-biological chemicals that existed on the primeval Earth. How they helped in the formation of life-as-we-know-it is what we are interested in," says co-author Kuhan Chandru.

The ELSI team did something simple yet profound: they took a large set of structurally diverse small organic molecules which could plausibly be made by prebiotic processes and tried to see if they could form polymers when evaporated from dilute solution. To their surprise, they found many of the primitive compounds could, though they also found some of them decomposed rapidly. This simple criterion, whether a compound is able to be dried without decomposing, may have been one of the earliest evolutionary selection pressures for primordial molecules.

The team conducted one further simple test. They took these dried reactions, added water and looked at them under a microscope. To their surprise, some of the products of these reaction formed cell-sized compartments. That simple starting materials containing 10 to 20 atoms can be converted to self-organised cell-like aggregates containing millions of atoms provides startling insight into how simple chemistry may have led to complex chemistry bordering on the kind of complexity associated with living systems, while not using modern biochemicals.

"We didn't test every possible compound, but we tested a lot of possible compounds. The diversity of chemical behaviors we found was surprising, and suggests this kind of small-molecule to functional-aggregate behavior is a common feature of organic chemistry, which may make the origin of life a more common phenomenon than previously thought," concludes co-author Niraja Bapat.

###

Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech)stands at the forefront of research and higher education as the leading university for science and technology in Japan. Tokyo Tech researchers excel in fields ranging from materials science to biology, computer science, and physics. Founded in 1881, Tokyo Tech hosts over 10,000 undergraduate and graduate students per year, who develop into scientific leaders and some of the most sought-after engineers in industry. Embodying the Japanese philosophy of "monotsukuri," meaning "technical ingenuity and innovation," the Tokyo Tech community strives to contribute to society through high-impact research.

The Earth-Life Science Institute (ELSI)is one of Japan's ambitious World Premiere International research centers, whose aim is to achieve progress in broadly inter-disciplinary scientific areas by inspiring the world's greatest minds to come to Japan and collaborate on the most challenging scientific problems. ELSI's primary aim is to address the origin and co-evolution of the Earth and life.

The World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI)was launched in 2007 by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) to help build globally visible research centers in Japan. These institutes promote high research standards and outstanding research environments that attract frontline researchers from around the world. These centers are highly autonomous, allowing them to revolutionise conventional modes of research operation and administration in Japan.

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Scientists discover new organic compounds that could have helped form the first cells - Newswise