Computer simulation of the plant spindle opens up new possibilities in cell division research

"We were surprised ourselves at how well our simulation reproduced our experimental data"

29-Aug-2024 - An interdisciplinary research team led by the Department of Biology at University of Hamburg and the Sainsbury Laboratory in Cambridge (England) has created the first three-dimensional computer simulation of a spindle. This simulation can now be used to better understand fundamental principles of ...

Seeing cancer’s spread through a computational window

Computational model allows researchers to simulate cellular-scale interactions across unprecedented distances in the human vasculature

29-Nov-2023 - Biomedical engineers at Duke University have significantly enhanced the capabilities of a computational model that simulates the movement of individual cancer cells across long distances within the entire human body. Called “Adaptive Physics Refinement (APR),” the approach captures detailed ...

House cats’ noses may function like highly efficient chemical analysis equipment

Parallels between cat noses and gas chromatography provide new insights into mammalian evolution

04-Jul-2023 - A new computer simulation of domestic cats’ noses suggests that the convoluted nasal structures involved in their sense of smell function similarly to parallel coiled gas chromatographs—laboratory equipment used for highly efficient analysis of the chemical makeup of substances. Zhenxing Wu of ...

More than microscopes can show

Computer simulations visualize how an essential stem cell protein opens wrapped DNA

23-Sep-2022 - A key protein for converting adult stem cells into cells that resemble embryonic stem cells has been visualized in unprecedented detail by an international team of researchers around Hans Schöler and Vlad Cojocaru of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine in Münster. By combing ...

Quantum chemistry on the test bench

28-Jul-2022 - In the future, more and more drugs, materials and catalysts will be designed, tested and developed using computer simulations alone. However, this will require algorithms that are accurate enough to predict real-life chemistry. One particular example is catalysis, where elementary rate constants ...

The platinum riddle

How a chemical reaction takes place that, at first glance, should not be possible at the temperatures observed

05-Apr-2022 - What happens when a cat climbs onto a sunflower? The sunflower is unstable, will quickly bend, and the cat will fall to the ground. However, if the cat only needs a quick boost to catch a bird from there, then the sunflower can act as a "metastable intermediate step". This is essentially the ...

New study shows novel crystal structure for hydrogen under high pressure

Researchers identify a potential crystal phase for hydrogen solidified at extreme pressures using data science and supercomputer simulations

18-Jan-2022 - Elements in the periodic table can take up multiple forms. Carbon, for example, exists as diamond or graphite depending on the environmental conditions at the time of formation. Crystal structures that have been formed in ultra-high-pressure environments are particularly important as they provide ...

New images lead to better prediction of shear thickening

It's relevant to everything from oil & gas to pharma manufacturing to food processing to chemical manufacturing

11-Oct-2021 - For the first time, researchers have been able capture images providing unprecedented details of how particles behave in a liquid suspension when the phenomenon known as shear thickening takes place. The work allows us to directly understand the processes behind shear thickening, which had ...

RNA: A new method to discover its high-resolution structure

New research combines experimental data and molecular dynamics simulations to study biomolecules in their natural environment

16-Jun-2021 - The structure of a biomolecule can reveal much about its functioning and interaction with the surrounding environment. The double-helical structure of DNA and its implications for the processes of transmission of genetic information form an obvious example. In a new study by SISSA - Scuola ...

Nucleosome breathing from atomistic time snapshots

Computer simulations visualize in atomic detail how DNA opens while wrapped around proteins

08-Jun-2021 - Researchers from the Hubrecht Institute in Utrecht (The Netherlands) and the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine in Münster (Germany) used computer simulations to reveal in atomic detail how a short piece of DNA opens while it is tightly wrapped around the proteins that package our ...