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China Biotech

Chinese Scientists Discover Structural Basis of Pre-mRNA Splicing 48

hackingbear writes: On August 21st, the research team led by Prof. Yigong Shi from School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University in China published two side-by-side research articles in Science, reporting the long-sought-after structure of a yeast spliceosome at 3.6 angstrom resolution determined by single particle cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), and the molecular mechanism of pre-messenger RNA splicing. Until now, decades of genetic and biochemical experiments have identified almost all proteins in spliceosome and uncovered some functions. Yet, the structure remained a mystery for a long time. The works, primarily performed by Dr. Chuangye Yan, and Ph.D students Jing Hang and Ruixue Wan under Prof. Yigong Shi's supervision, settled this Holy Grail question and established the structural basis for the related area. This work was supported by funds from the Ministry of Science and Technology and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.
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Chinese Scientists Discover Structural Basis of Pre-mRNA Splicing

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 24, 2015 @12:30AM (#50377963)

    Those were good years.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • We still do. It's just that many of those scientists end up going back to their home country to be back with family.

        Yigong Shi was in fact a tenured professor at Princeton until a few years ago. I think the Chinese gov't. basically threw gobs of money at him to move to Tsinghua. Before, he was just one of many excellent structural biologists in the US; now, he's arguably the foremost Chinese structural biologist. (Downside: exchanging Princeton faculty meetings for CCP oversight; I'm not sure which sound

    • And remember when we could apply science, American or otherwise, to the problems we face without the default reaction being total gibbering fear?

    • by m00sh ( 2538182 )

      Those were good years.

      But you can compensate for it by making racist jokes.

      Seriously though, you mean when only America had science. It is a good thing that a country with a billion people are doing scientific achievements. We should be ecstatic that China is in the game and the rate of scientific progress for humanity will increase by multiple factors. The science performed by a Chinese scientist versus an American one doesn't matter, everyone can benefit.

    • by TheSync ( 5291 )

      Perhaps we should be happy that global economic growth is allowing hundreds of thousands of new biologists to study the science?

      As Julian Simone noted [wikipedia.org], the ultimate resource is not something like oil, or copper, or water, but instead the ultimate resource is the power of the human mind - and the more human minds that we can bring online to solving problems, the better off the world will be.

      Anyway there is plenty of science in the US. In 2013, two Americans and one America-based scientist won the nobel priz [nobelprize.org]

    • This is just nonsensical. The vast majority of articles like this still come from the US/EU/Japan, and most of the technology was developed outside China. In fact, the only reason they're able to do this kind of research is that the last few years have seen exceptional improvements in molecular EM due to a combination of better software and direct electron detectors. In fact, I looked through their methods, and they're using a microscope made by a US/international company, a detector from Japan, and soft

  • by cartesius ( 4227459 ) on Monday August 24, 2015 @12:52AM (#50378039)
    From TFA: Besides the basic biological importance of spliceosome, numerous diseases are related to the dysfunction of spliceosomal regulation or the splicing mistakes. Almost 35 percent of genetic disorder is resulted from wrong splicing
  • This has nothing to do with politics. It should be on some nerd Web site! >:-(

    Before you down mod me, go review the front page.

I THINK THEY SHOULD CONTINUE the policy of not giving a Nobel Prize for paneling. -- Jack Handley, The New Mexican, 1988.

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