Most animals appear symmetrical at first glance, but we're full of internal lop-sidedness. From the hand used to pick up a pencil or throw a baseball, to where language is generated in the brain, to the orientation of our internal organs, humans are a glut of asymmetries. Worms aren't so different: The roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans has nerves on its left and right sides that perform different functions. Like handedness, the determination of which nerves develop on which side seems random from worm to worm.

Scientists at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), in cooperation with the CSIC, have developed a new electro-chemical biosensor which detects the presence, in food, of very small amounts of atrazine –one of the most widely used herbicides in agriculture and which also has very long lasting effects on the environment- as well as antibiotics in food.

The biosensor is faster, more portable and economic than the expensive laboratory methods which are used to detect contaminants, while having a very similar sensitivity. The system has been tested successfully to detect pesticides in samples of drinking water and commercial orange juice, as well as to detect traces of antibiotics in cow's milk.

A key aspect of how embryos create the cells which secrete insulin is revealed in a new study published tomorrow (18 May) in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The researchers hope that their findings will enable the development of new therapies for diabetes, a condition caused by insufficient levels of insulin.

The research reveals that glucose plays a key role in enabling healthy beta cells, which secrete insulin, to develop in the pancreas of an embryo. Glucose prompts a gene called Neurogenin3 to switch on another gene, known as NeuroD, which is crucial for the normal development of beta cells. If glucose levels are low this gene is not switched on.

Protected by its own nutrients and blood supply, a beating heart supported by an investigational organ preservation device was successfully transplanted into a 47-year-old man with congestive heart failure and pulmonary hypertension on Sunday, April 8. The surgery was performed at UPMC by Kenneth R. McCurry, M.D., assistant professor of surgery, division of cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and director of cardiopulmonary transplantation at UPMC's Heart, Lung and Esophageal Surgery Institute.

Passive immunization through the development of fully human antibodies specific to Plasmodium falciparum may be effective at controlling the disease, report researchers led by Dr. Richard S. McIntosh from the University of Nottingham. The researchers developed these novel reagents by antibody repertoire cloning generated from immune Gambian adults.

Now that the genome sequences of hundreds of bacteria and viruses are known, we can design tests that will rapidly detect the presence of these species based solely on their DNA. These tests can detect a pathogen in a complex mixture of organic material by recognizing short, distinguishing sequences—called DNA signatures—that occur in the pathogen and not in any other species.

Adam Phillippy and colleagues from the University of Maryland, USA, have developed a computer program that can identify these signatures with a higher degree of accuracy than ever before. They describe this new computational system, called Insignia, and the results of its successful application on 46 Vibrio cholerae strains this week in the journal PLoS Computational Biology.