Neuroscience

Scientists reveal structures of neurotransmitter transporter

Neurons talk to each other using chemical signals called neurotransmitters. Scientists at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have drawn on structural biology expertise to determine structures of vesicular monoamine transporter ...

Oncology & Cancer

How silencing a gene-silencer could lead to new cancer drugs

Deep inside our cells— each one complete with an identical set of genes— a molecular machine known as PRC2 plays a critical role in determining which cells become heart cells, vs. brain or muscle or skin cells.

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

Rapid inactivation of human respiratory RNA viruses by DUV LEDs

Human respiratory RNA viruses, such as SARS-CoV-2 and influenza A virus (IAV), spread rapidly in the human population by airway transmission and caused substantial morbidity, mortality, economic losses, and pandemic diseases ...

Neuroscience

Functioning of antibodies in autoimmune encephalitis deciphered

Using a state-of-the-art method, researchers at DZNE and the University of Texas have succeeded for the first time at unraveling the effects of autoimmune antibodies that are directed against the brain in detail at the atomic ...

Alzheimer's disease & dementia

Novel Alzheimer's disease amyloid β polymorph revealed

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurological condition leading to dementia that worsens with age as patients exhibit cognitive, memory, and psychological deficits. While current therapies focus on relieving these symptoms to ...

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Perturbation theory (quantum mechanics)

In quantum mechanics, perturbation theory is a set of approximation schemes directly related to mathematical perturbation for describing a complicated quantum system in terms of a simpler one. The idea is to start with a simple system for which a mathematical solution is known, and add an additional "perturbing" Hamiltonian representing a weak disturbance to the system. If the disturbance is not too large, the various physical quantities associated with the perturbed system (e.g. its energy levels and eigenstates) can, from considerations of continuity, be expressed as 'corrections' to those of the simple system. These corrections, being 'small' compared to the size of the quantities themselves, can be calculated using approximate methods such as asymptotic series. We can therefore study the complicated system based on our knowledge of the simpler one.

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