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Bill Nye and the Discovery Channel give you the greatest discoveries in science. Bill Nye and the Discovery Channel give you the greatest discoveries in science. It took 150 years to progress from Mendel's experiments with peas to the complete sequencing of the human genome. Host Bill Nye explores why certain traits are passed through families and species. He discusses the process by which scientists came to understand that inherited information is passed according to rules. Featuring discoveries related to DNA and its breakthrough as the chemical basis of genetic information, as well as a set of instructions for making the essential proteins of life. Nye also explains that RNA is the messenger that carries the instructions from living cells to enable protein production. Nye visits FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., where DNA becomes personal. The discovery that DNA sequences are unique to each individual ushered in the era of criminal forensics, playing an important role in courtrooms ever since.

Scientists have shown for the first time that "lifeless" prion proteins, devoid of all genetic material, can evolve just like higher forms of life.

"Todd Rider, a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is developing an antiviral drug called Draco, which has proven successful against all 15 viruses to which it has been applied in lab trials with human tissue and mice. These include the common cold, H1N1 or swine flu, a polio virus, dengue fever and the notorious and fatal Ebola virus. To produce it, Mr Rider took an unusual approach, "wiring together" two natural proteins - one that detects virus entry, and another that acts as a suicide switch that kills the infected cell."

Join Bill Nye as he delves into the Greatest Discoveries in Biology. This program explains how the early use of microscopes and Anton Van Leeuwenhock's accidental discovery set the stage for studying microorganisms. It explores 19th century research breakthroughs and covers cell division, sex cell division, and cell differentiation. Learn how the discovery of mitochondria has helped us understand reproduction, ancestral lines, and cancer; how cells convert sugars, fats, and proteins into energy in the Krebs Cycle; and how they communicate through neurotransmitters and hormones. Explore the process of photosynthesis and how the discovery of the ecosystem process bridged biology with physics, chemistry, and other fields of science that describe the environment.

"Cells grown in microgravity generate problematic proteins (absent in normal stem cells) that play a role in bone deterioration."

Dna Molecular Biology Visualizations - Wrapping And Replication.mpg