Slipping a note to a neighbour: the cellular way

How cells send messages to each other

02-Jul-2024 - Researchers have gained new knowledge of how drugs bind to connexin molecules. These molecules form channels that allow neighbouring cells to send direct messages to one another. Dysfunctions of these channels are involved in neurological and cardiac diseases. The new understanding of how drugs ...

Shedding light on the origin of complex life forms

Researchers cultivate "missing link" microorganism

29-Dec-2022 - How did the complex organisms on Earth arise? This is one of the big open questions in biology. A collaboration between the working groups of Christa Schleper at the University of Vienna and Martin Pilhofer at ETH Zurich has come a step closer to the answer. The researchers succeeded in ...

The Achilles heel of the Coronavirus

Frameshifting as possible target for antiviral drug development

19-May-2021 - SARS-​CoV-2 is critically dependent on a special mechanism for the production of its proteins. A collaborative team led by a research group at ETH Zurich obtained molecular insights into this process and demonstrated that it can be inhibited by chemical compounds, thereby significantly reducing ...

Mechanism discovered how the coronavirus hijacks the cell

A starting point for vaccine and drug development

15-Sep-2020 - Researchers at ETH Zurich and the University of Bern have discovered a mechanism by which the corona virus manipulates human cells to ensure its own replication. This knowledge will help to develop drugs and vaccines against the corona virus. Like a pirate hijacking a ship, a virus takes control ...

How enzymes build sugar trees

Findings could accelerate development of new, protein-​based medications

02-Mar-2020 - Researchers have used cryo-​electron microscopy to elucidate for the first time the structure and function of a very small enzyme embedded in cell membranes. This enzyme builds complex sugar trees that are subsequently attached to other membrane proteins. The findings could accelerate the ...

Monitoring the corrosion of bioresorbable magnesium

Better prediction of degradation rate of magnesium implants

28-Oct-2019 - ETH researchers have recently been able to monitor the corrosion of bioresorbable magnesium alloys at the nanoscale over a time scale of a few seconds to many hours. This is an important step towards accurately predicting how fast implants are resorbed by the body to enable the development of ...

How multicellular cyanobacteria transport molecules

16-Jul-2019 - Researchers from ETH Zurich and the University of Tübingen have taken a high-resolution look at the structure and function of cell-to-cell connections in filamentous, multicellular cyanobacteria. This enables them to explain how these microorganisms regulate the transport of various substances ...

Sticking sugar to protein

Researchers clarified the 3D structure of an important enzyme that links sugar to proteins – a breakthrough

09-Feb-2018 - Whenever cells receive signals, interact with other cells or identify viruses and bacteria, the process involves not only proteins but also sugar chains attached to their surface. The subject of relatively little attention until now, these structures differ widely in composition and branching, ...

Architecture of mTOR Protein Complex Solved

22-Dec-2015 - For a long time it has been known that the protein TOR – Target of Rapamycin – controls cell growth and is involved in the development of diseases such as cancer and diabetes. Researchers at the University of Basel’s Biozentrum together with scientists from ETH Zurich have now examined the ...

Making sure antibiotics work as they should

10-Oct-2014 - A team of ETH Zurich researchers led by professors Nenad Ban and Ruedi Aebersold have studied the highly complex molecular structure of mitoribosomes, which are the ribosomes of mitochondria. Ribosomes are found in the cells of all living organisms. However, higher organisms (eukaryotes), which ...