Living at home in old age: This is what most older adults want. As a result, there is a high demand for senior apartments and tailor-made services for the care of older adults in need of assistance in their own households. This is one of the main findings of the population survey in Canton Basel-Landschaft, which was conducted as part of the "Inspire" project.
Many diseases are caused by defects in signaling pathways of body cells. In the future, bioactive nanocapsules could become a valuable tool for medicine to control these pathways. Researchers from the University of Basel have taken an important step in this direction: They succeed in having several different nanocapsules work in tandem to amplify a natural signaling cascade and influence cell behavior.
Phosphorus is essential for agriculture, yet this important plant nutrient is increasingly being lost from soils around the world. The primary cause is soil erosion, reports an international research team led by the University of Basel.
With life expectancy increasing, age-related diseases are also on the rise, including sarcopenia, the loss of muscle mass due to aging. Researchers from the University of Basel’s Biozentrum have demonstrated that a well-known drug can delay the progression of age-related muscle weakness.
Metastases are formed by cancer cells that break away from the primary tumor. A research group at the University of Basel has now identified lack of oxygen as the trigger for this process. The results reveal an important relationship between the oxygen supply to tumors and the formation of metastases.
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Over the long-term, what one partner in a two-person relationship wishes to avoid, so too does the other partner – and what one wants to achieve, so does the other. These effects can be observed regardless of gender, age and length of the relationship.
Physicists at the University of Basel have developed a minuscule instrument able to detect extremely faint magnetic fields. At the heart of the superconducting quantum interference device are two atomically thin layers of graphene, which the researchers combined with boron nitride. Instruments like this one have applications in areas such as medicine, besides being used to research new materials.
Learning languages in the virtual classroom: the University of Basel’s Language Center has moved the greater part of its programs online. The changes have been challenging – but the instructors are discovering new ways of teaching languages.
The European Research Council has awarded ERC Starting Grants to two scientists from Basel. The prestigious funding goes to the biochemist Prof. Dr. Maria Hondele from the University of Basel and Dr. Johannes Felsenberg from the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research.
