European cisco roe is known as a Swedish delicacy. A new study has shown that there are different types of European cisco in Swedish waters that are each genetically adapted to fresh, saline or brackish water. Genetics also steers when European cisco spawn. The new knowledge from this study can be used in sustainable management of the species, and for investigating whether the spawning environment affects the quality of the roe. The study was conducted by researchers at Uppsala University, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (KTH), Stockholm University, and the Museum of Natural History, and was recently published in the journal Molecular Ecology.

A study published today in Nature Structural & Molecular Biology is the first time researchers have shown evidence that a single drug, already licensed for medical use, can stabilise nearly all mutated versions of a human protein, regardless of where the mutation is in the sequence. The findings could help tackle a longstanding challenge in rare disease medicine. Rather than look for a drug that targets a single mutation, researchers could instead look for one that targets stabilising an entire protein, greatly accelerating drug discovery.

A University of the Sunshine Coast researcher has caught on camera and documented for the first time a rare – and rather risqué – shark mating sequence in the wild.

A joint team has uncovered how soft, deformable particles, like cells, behave in microfluidic channels. Using precisely fabricated hydrogel particles and simulations on the supercomputer "Fugaku," they demonstrated that particle softness dramatically alters their focusing patterns, deviating significantly from rigid particle behavior. These findings reveal distinct "phase transitions" in focusing, shifting from mid-edge to eight-point, diagonal-edge, and finally center focusing as deformability increases. This breakthrough, explained by a new theoretical model incorporating inertia and deformability, offers crucial insights for designing next-generation microfluidic devices for highly efficient cell sorting and other biomedical applications like early cancer detection. The ability to control particle focusing based on deformability opens exciting possibilities for advanced particle manipulation and separation technologies.