Reconstructed Prebiotics
For decades, origin-of-life researchers have debated how amino acids were first linked together to form proteins in the absence of ribosomes, the cell organelles that do the job today. Recent work suggests that a "protoribosome" made from a bundle of RNA could have done the trick, Amber Dance reports for Nature. In a story for Quanta published last May, Yasemin Saplakoglu reported on an alternative hypothesis that the earliest peptides could have grown at the ends of paired strands of RNA. Further experiments aim to unveil the true origin of life's machinery.
Brain Momifications
"Mommy brain" is a real thing in new mothers, but not as it's disparagingly portrayed in popular culture. A mother's brain reorganizes its connections to prepare for learning how to keep a baby alive, explains Aimee Cunningham for Science News. Understanding the circuitry that gets turned on in parents' brains is vital to understanding disorders such as postpartum depression. In 2020, the molecular neuroscientist Catherine Dulac spoke with Claudia Dreifus for Quanta about her research into sex-specific behaviors and postpartum depression in mothers. | |
