Author: WeWorldMedia-admin

Tiny lenses grown from bacteria and enzymes may help doctors see inside cells

Published: 7 April 2025
Categories: National Science Foundation

RSS feed source: National Science Foundation

A team of researchers supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation has successfully made self-growing microlenses using bacteria and enzymes found in sea sponges. Because the microlenses are created by bacterial cell factories that function at standard temperatures and pressures, they are less expensive to produce — and they are exceptional at focusing light into very bright beams. The microlenses could allow for higher-resolution image sensors that go beyond current capabilities, potentially allowing doctors to more clearly see tiny structures inside cells.

In nature, sea sponges mineralize silica-based glass at a cellular level to create their intricate and strong glass skeletons. The researchers replicated that mechanism in a lab setting. Their research was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

“This research is the first to engineer light-focusing properties into bacteria cells, and I am excited to explore the different possibilities that our work has opened up,” says one of the study’s authors and University of Rochester researcher Anne S. Meyer.

Credit: Photo by J. Adam Fenster/University of Rochester

University of Rochester graduate student Lynn Sidor prepares a batch of bacteria cells that will self-assemble their own glass coating, in the lab of associate professor Anne S. Meyer. Meyer has worked with colleagues in optics and physics to develop a new type of

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Foundations for Digital Twins as Catalyzers of Biomedical Technological Innovation (FDT-BioTech)

Published: 4 April 2025
Categories: NSF Due Dates

RSS feed source: National Science Foundation

NSF Financial Assistance awards (grants and cooperative agreements) made on or after October 1, 2024, will be subject to the applicable set of award conditions, dated October 1, 2024, available on the NSF website. These terms and conditions are consistent with the revised guidance specified in the OMB Guidance for Federal Financial Assistance published in the Federal Register on April 22, 2024.

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Conserving the White Oak Tree: Critical for timber and distilling industries

Published: 3 April 2025
Categories: National Science Foundation

RSS feed source: National Science Foundation

A group of researchers from the University of Kentucky, The University of Tennessee and Indiana University, including those supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, have collaborated with scientists from the U.S. Forest Service and others to produce the first complete genome for the white oak (Quercus alba), a tree that provides large amounts of timber and is the primary species used in barrels for aging spirits.

Credit: Matthew Barton, University of Kentucky

The white oak at Makers Mark Star Hill Farm that provided the sample for recent NSF-funded work to develop a haploid genome for the species, which can be used in conserving this economically important tree.

Data to complete the genome came from a range of academic sources, the Forest Service, state forest services and industry. By combining those data into an unbiased annotation of the white oak’s genes, the researchers have created a resource to understand genetic diversity and population differentiation within the species, assess disease resistance and the evolution of genes that enhance it, and compare with other oak genomes to determine evolutionary relationships between species and how the genomes have evolved.

“Plants, including trees, help meet society’s needs for food, fuel, fiber and, in this case, other key economic services. Having genomic data like this helps us address

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