Bio Photonics Research

The temperate rainforests of the Chilean Coast Range are home to a spectacular array of life: iridescent blue lizards, tiny wild cats called kodkods, and curly vines of waxy red bellflowers. Towering over this biodiversity are endangered ancient conifers , called alerce (Fitzroya cupressoides), whose trunks can get as wide as shipping containers. These alerce forests show exceptionally low mortality and grow slowly—one tree lived more than 3,600 years. Ancient giants and hidden fungal worlds New research published today in the journal  Biodiversity and Conservation  makes clear that these massive trees also shelter an enormous assortment of organisms belowground that have helped the forest, a massive carbon sink, survive and adapt over millennia. One large individual—estimated to be over 2,400 years old—hosts more than twice the underground fungal diversity of smaller, younger trees of the same species. The bigger the alerce, the greater the variety of fungi that scientists fo...

  A study examining fossil evidence shows that large land predators were already hunting big plant-eating animals more than 280 million years ago . University of Toronto Mississauga researchers Jordan M. Young, Tea Maho, and Robert Reisz studied bite marks on the skeletons of three young herbivores from the early Permian of Texas, revealing feeding patterns from multiple predators and a glimpse into how animals hunted and interacted with each other. "This discovery shows predator-prey hierarchies were formed earlier than previously expected," said Professor Reisz, co-author of the work titled "Earliest direct evidence of  trophic interactions   between terrestrial apex predators and large herbivores." "While these interactions are well known in the 'Age of Reptiles,' there has been little information available in the  Paleozoic Era , when terrestrial vertebrates first evolved into large apex predators and herbivores," added Reisz. Master's stud...

  Early mammalian ancestors were nocturnal, sleeping during the day while the dinosaurs dominated the land. However, some mammalian lineages, including human ancestors, independently transitioned to diurnality (active during the day). Scientists have now discovered why humans are not nocturnal. A new study   published   in   Science   reveals that the answer is in the genes. How the transition happened has been a long-standing puzzle because the brain's master circadian clock works similarly in both nocturnal and diurnal species. Cells, signals and daily rhythms The new research shows that the crucial difference lies not in the brain's wiring but in how  individual cells  respond to signals in their microenvironment. Over each 24-hour cycle, small shifts in the body's internal conditions like temperature or fluid balance subtly influence the chemical reactions inside cells. These physical cues adjust basic cell processes, such as how proteins are made ...

Tiny insects trapped in amber could tell us a great deal about their roles in past ecosystems: pollinators, parasites, predators, and prey. But how many of the insects preserved alongside each other reflect interactions during life, and how many are just unlucky coincidences? Scientists in Spain scrutinized six key samples which preserve now-extinct insects unusually well, to try to learn more about the ants that lived at the same time as the dinosaurs. "Amber inclusions are representative of possible interactions between different organisms shaping the environment," explained Dr. Jose de la Fuente of the Institute for Game and Wildlife Research, Spain, lead author of the article in  Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution . "The identification and morphological characterization of fossil ants in amber with other inclusions of insects provides a snapshot of life on Earth millions of years ago." Snapshots of the past The scientists looked at six different pieces of amber ...

Researchers from the University of Sydney and the Centenary Institute have discovered how a promising class of experimental antibiotics disrupts the bacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB), paving the way for urgently needed new treatments. Globally, TB remains a major health crisis, claiming around 1.2 million lives each year and ranking among the world's deadliest infectious diseases. The rise of drug-resistant strains, including in the Asia-Pacific region, has made the search for new treatment strategies increasingly urgent. Investigating three experimental compounds In a study published in  Nature Communications , the team investigated how three naturally occurring antibiotic compounds—ecumicin, ilamycin and cyclomarin—act on a vital protein degradation machine inside Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium that causes TB. The molecular machine, known as the ClpC1–ClpP1P2 complex, allows the bacterium to break down damaged or unneeded proteins, helping it to survive stress an...

Researchers have discovered and characterized at the atomic level a mechanism that enables bacterial pathogens—including hospital bacteria Acinetobacter baumannii and Pseudomonas aeruginosa—to assemble antibiotic-resistant three-dimensional (3D) biofilms. These findings open a new avenue for developing therapies against multidrug-resistant bacterial infections by targeting the biofilm assembly. The work is  published  in the journal  Nature Communications . Many pathogenic bacteria form 3D biofilms to protect themselves from the immune system, antibiotic treatments, and drying on environmental surfaces. Some of the most problematic hospital bacteria, such as multidrug-resistant A. baumannii and P. aeruginosa, use specialized hair-like filaments called adhesive pili to attach to tissues or abiotic surfaces. After attaching, the bacteria then grow into thick 3D biofilms consisting of multiple layers of bacteria. This process is also mediated by adhesive pili, but until now ...

  Depending on others for something you need may feel like a risky proposition—and perhaps a human one. It is actually a survival strategy found in the microbial world, and far more frequently than one might expect. Discovering why is key to understanding how microbes form stable communities across medical, industrial, and ecological settings. A new study by bioengineering professor Sergei Maslov (CAIM co-leader), computational scientist Ashish George, and biology professor Tong Wang explores why interdependence can be such a winning move for microbial communities. Their work,  published   in   Cell Systems , demonstrated that a mathematical model of how bacteria produce and share resources accurately predicted the outcome of experiments with living E. coli strains. The researchers' collaboration began during their time as colleagues at the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. George continued the collaboration i...