Futurity.org » sulfur

Thanks to copper, sulfur’s stink repels us

Karl Bates-Duke — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 20:11:14 +0000

DUKE (US) — Copper ions may be the cause of our sensitivity to sulfurous odors, like skunks, volcanic gases, and armpits.

When Hiroaki Matsunami, associate professor at Duke University, set out to study a chemical in male mouse urine called MTMT that attracts female mice, he didn’t think he would stumble into a new field of study.

Protein’s arm controls iron-sulfur cluster

Jade Boyd-Rice — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 15:53:41 +0000

RICE (US) —Scientists have learned how a protein that plays a role in diabetes, cancer, and aging uses entwined arm movements to control a potentially toxic payload of iron and sulfur.

“We scrutinize proteins with an unconventional approach,” says José Onuchic, professor of physics and astronomy and co-director of the Center for Theoretical Biological Physics at Rice University.

In African rocks, traces of evolutionary blast

Futurity-Jenny Leonard — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 08:00:11 +0000

UNC marine geologist Justin Ries in the Zebra River Valley, southern Namibia. The Nama Group carbonates, which contain sulfur isotopic signatures suggesting that low marine sulfate and low atmospheric oxygen conditions persisted up until the Cambrian Explosion, loom in the background. (Credit: Gordon Love)

UNC CHAPEL HILL (US)—New research has opened the door on what some consider to be the greatest event in the history of animal life: a massive evolutionary jumpstart during the Cambrian Explosion half a billion years ago.