Science Stories

Solving the 3D structure of a protein from amino acid sequences has been the mystery that has puzzled many scientists. With the advancement in AI, a biologist at Harvard have developed an algorithm which he claimed it will work 1 million times faster than Google’s AlphaFold , fastest protein structure predictor for the moment. Prediction of Protein structure using the amino acid sequence has been the grandest quest, biologist of the world is trying to solve. The race to predict the structure from the amino acid sequence has intensified in the last decade. Many scientists using mathematical modeling, molecular biology, and computer science have developed many tools and algorithms to predict the correct structure with great efficiency and less time. AlphaFold is one of those, an algorithm developed by Google’s firm Deep mind that predicts proteins structure faster than the present techniques by at least 15%. AlphaFold :  The algorithm uses neural networks to predict physical...

Top 5 public companies working on gene editing . The ranking based on the revenues generated in 2018. 1.    Sangamo Therapeutics: $84.5million  This is an American biotechnology company. They apply cell and gene therapy to combat hemophilia and other genetic diseases. They base the company in California, USA. They develop Zinc Finger gene-editing technology. Clinical trials involving gene editing using Zinc Finger Nuclease (ZFN) are ongoing. Sangamo therapeutics building 2.    Horizon Discovery Group: $73.7m It is a gene-editing company that designs and engineers genetically modified cells and then applies them in research and clinical applications that advance human health. They used three gene-editing tools CRISPR, ZFN, and recombinant A deno -associated virus ( rAAV ). The company saw a 68% rise in revenue. The revenue was  £58.7million and based in Waterbeach, United Kingdom. Horizon discovery group main building 3...

Sangamo therapeutics on July 1 announced publication of a manuscript in Nature Medicine on the activity of allele-specific Zinc Finger Proteins (ZFP-TFs) in models of Huntington’s Disease. The data which was published online on July 1 will appear in the July 2019 issue of    Nature Medicine . Scientists from Sangamo and its collaborators from CHDI foundation have used Zinc Finger Proteins Transcriptions Factors (ZFP-TFs) to selectively targets mutant allele of the Huntington gene (HTT) and repress its expression 99% while retaining 86% of the normal allele. Huntington is a fatal, progressive, neurodegenerative disorder caused by a dominant mutation involving the expansion of CAG trinucleotide repeat in exon 1 of the   HTT  gene. Fully penetrant disease alleles of mutant  HTT  have more than 39 CAG repeats, but most HD patients have one healthy wild-type copy of  HTT  with less than 22 CAG repeats . Sangamo scientist has develope...