On the road to doing independent scientific research, graduate school is a rite of passage. And so is the NIH—at least for the students who choose to do their dissertation work there. Their Ph.D. still comes from an academic institution, but it’s based on research done in an NIH intramural laboratory. This setup is all part of the Graduate Partnerships Program (GPP).
Many believe that resveratrol—a chemical found in red wine as well as in grapes, peanuts, and other plants—protects against aging-associated diseases such as type 2 diabetes. But no one has fully understood how it works. In February, senior investigator Jay H. Chung and colleagues at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute published a paper explaining how resveratrol affects enzymes that increase the activity of the aging-associated protein Sirtuin 1 (Sirt1). (Cell148:421-433, 2012).
NICHD Neuroscientists Link Neuron Age to Memory Formation
BY HEATHER DOLAN
Deep in the center of the brain is the cashew-size hippocampus, an organ essential to the formation of new memories. Without it we’d only remember the old ones. Scientists thought they understood how certain cells within the hippocampus played a crucial role in episodic memory. But recently, two NICHD neuroscientists—Christopher McBain and Kenneth Pelkey—contributed to a discovery that has turned that thinking on its head. (Cell149:188–201, 2012)
