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Study Shows Common Molecular Tool Kit Organisms Share Across Tree of Life

Researchers created the world’s largest protein map, identifying nearly 1,000 protein complexes that are shared across the tree of life. This image shows a small portion of that map.

Graduate Student Selected for International Research Fellowship

Yoori Kim

Freshman Researchers Receive Grand Challenges Explorations Grant

University of Texas at Austin freshmen, working to develop do-it-yourself health care diagnostics, make up a research group that was announced today as a Grand Challenges Explorations winner, through an initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Beauty and the Yeast (Audio)

Partly Human Yeast Show A Common Ancestor’s Lasting Legacy

Despite a billion years of evolution separating humans from the baker’s yeast in their refrigerators, hundreds of genes from an ancestor that the two species have in common live on nearly unchanged in them both, say biologists at The University of Texas at Austin. The team created thriving strains of genetically engineered yeast using human genes and found that certain groups of genes are surprisingly stable over evolutionary time.

Genetic Road Map May Bring About Better Cotton Crops

A University of Texas at Austin scientist, working with an international research team, has developed the most precise sequence map yet of U.S. cotton and will soon create an even more detailed map for navigating the complex cotton genome.

New Cystic Fibrosis Research Examines Deadly Pathogen

A new method of testing the most common cause of life-threatening infection in people with cystic fibrosis could improve efforts to study and combat the illness.

Nature May Produce Reaction thought Earlier to Be in Only Synthetic Chemists' Power

Discovered nearly a century ago, the Diels-Alder reaction has been used by synthetic chemists in many industries to produce everything from morphine to plastics. It turns out nature, too, may be performing Diels-Alder-like reactions, researchers have found. 

New Protein Booster May Lead to Better DNA Vaccines and Gene Therapy

Scientists have discovered a new way to manipulate how cells function, a finding that might help advance an experimental approach to improving public health: DNA vaccines, which could be more efficient, less expensive and easier to store than traditional vaccines.

Cyanobacterium Found in UT Algae Collection Holds Biotech Promise

A fast-growing bacterial strain found on the campus of The University of Texas at Austin in the 1950s might ultimately prove useful for carbon sequestration, biofuel production, biosynthesis of valuable chemicals and the search for novel pharmaceuticals, scientists announced in newly published paper.

Freshman Research Initiative Spotlight: Discovering Antibiotics

With the arrival of the spring semester, hundreds of first-year undergraduates in the College of Natural Sciences will join one of over 27 research streams in the Freshman Research Initiative (FRI), searching for answers to some of modern science's most pressing questions, and gathering important research experience along the way.

Freshman Research Initiative Students Published in Nature Genetics

The groundbreaking Freshman Research Initiative (FRI) program at The University of Texas at Austin helped a pair of students put a coveted feather in their cap quite early in their academic careers: the chance to say they’ve been published in a top-tier scientific journal from the prestigious Nature Publishing Group.

Mouth Bacteria Can Change Its Diet, Supercomputers Reveal

The following excerpt is from an article and podcast by Jorge Salazar, published August 12, 2014 on the TACC website:

Raising the Tail: Jim Allison's Pioneering Cancer Treatment

This excerpt is from an article by Jenny Blair, published May 2, 2014 in The Alcalde:

Researchers Discover Why It's So Hard to Grow an Extra Finger

The fact that most humans have five digits on each hand and foot is due in part to a complex developmental pathway called Hedgehog. If something goes wrong in this process during development, say a mutation in a critical gene that affects its expression, a person might be born with extra fingers or toes, a condition known as polydactyly. New research shows that for at least one part of the pathway, there is a sort of failsafe mechanism that seems to make it harder for mistakes to happen.