Reporting recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University say they've devised the first-ever method of combing through the body's tens of thousands of proteins to inventory sites of S-nitrosylation (S-NO). But because these S-NO bonds are so fragile, it has been notoriously difficult to spot exactly where, among the thousands of cellular proteins, NO is reacting and having its effects.  The new technique, called SNO Site IDentification (SNOSID), quickly screens the proteome — the body's thousands of gene-expressed proteins — to find S-nitrosylation sites. The method relies on state-of-the-art mass spectrometry for sequencing amino acids from hundreds of peptides in protein digests obtained from cells and organs. "It's a real breakthrough for both basic science and drug research — a tool that should significantly accelerate our understanding of nitric oxide signaling," says senior researcher Dr. Steven S. Gross, Professor of Pharmacology at Weill Cornell Medical College. Read the press release.

The journal PLoS Genetics has published the findings of a team of scientists at the Boston Biomedical Research Institute that provides a whole genome analysis of the protein kinases from a scientifically valuable model organism known as Dictyostelium. Led by Dr. Janet Smith, this study offers important insights into the evolution of kinases, which are enzymes involved in cell communication pathways. To solve the kinome of Dictyostelium, Smith and her colleagues utilized the power of bioinformatics, a scientific technique which employs databases and computer algorithms to allow researchers to gain information and compile data about genes and kinases in a fast and efficient way, which can be very useful for drug discovery and development. Read the article.

Phase Forward announced Central Coding for InForm, a new Web-based application that is optimized to work with InForm Integrated Trial Management (ITM), Phase Forward’s electronic data capture (EDC) product. Central Coding for InForm automatically standardizes clinical trial data input to provide cleaner data more quickly and efficiently for organizations conducting clinical trials. Read the press release.