About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
Nov 01, 2007...
Prof. Naama Barkai will receive the Helen and Martin Kimmel Award for Innovative Investigation on Monday, Nov. 5 at the Weizmann Institute. The award is accompanied by a research grant of a million dollars over five years.
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—November 1, 2007—Taking a chance on an experiment — this is one of the impulses that drive evolution. Living cells are, from this angle, great subjects for experimentation: Changes in one molecule can have all sorts of interesting consequences for many other molecules in the cell. Such experiments on genes and proteins have led the cell, and indeed all life, on a long and fascinating evolutionary journey.
Oct 30, 2019...
Pairs of face images that elicited similar (left column) and different (right column) neuronal activation patterns. Each bar shows the response of one electrode to the face in the photo; the higher the bar and the lighter the red, the stronger the response
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—October 30, 2019—Our brains are so primed to recognize faces – or to tell people apart – that we rarely even stop to think about it, but what happens in the brain when it engages in such recognition is still far from understood. In a new study published in Nature Communications, researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science have shed new light on this issue. They found a striking similarity between the way in which faces are encoded in the brain and successfully performing artificial intelligence (AI) systems known as deep neural networks.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/the-secret-social-lives-of-viruses/
Jun 18, 2019...
Illustration by Karol Banach
Geneticist Rotem Sorek could see that his bacteria were sick — so far, so good. He had deliberately infected them with a virus to test whether each ailing microbe soldiered on alone or communicated with its allies to fight the attack.
But when he and his team at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, looked into the contents of their flasks, they saw something completely unexpected: the bacteria were silent, and it was the viruses that were chattering away, passing notes to each other in a molecular language only they could understand. They were deciding together when to lie low in the host cell and when to replicate and burst out, in search of new victims.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/scientists-map-mouse-personality/
Nov 07, 2019...
Some mice are curious and explore every new hiding place. Others are more anxious and prefer to stay in their nest. ©MPI f. Molecular Genetics
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich, Germany, together with colleagues at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel have developed a computational method to objectively measure the personality of mice living in a semi-natural, group environment.
Jun 17, 2009... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—June 17, 2009—Bacteria can anticipate a future event and prepare for it, according to new research at the Weizmann Institute of Science. In a paper that appeared in the June 17, 2009 issue of Nature, Prof. Yitzhak Pilpel, doctoral student Amir Mitchell, and research associate Dr. Orna Dahan of the Institute’s Department of Molecular Genetics, together with Prof. Martin Kupiec and Gal Romano of Tel Aviv University, examined microorganisms living in environments that change in predictable ways. Their findings show that these microorganisms’ genetic networks are hard-wired to “foresee” what comes next in the sequence of events and begin responding to the new state of affairs before its onset.
Jul 25, 2018...
A “walk” in composition space for a “Lipid World” molecular assembly, shown in simplified 3D. A point on the line signifies a specific composition along the time axis, whereby the three coordinates are amounts of the three different molecule types. A “composome” (pink background) is a time interval when the composition stays almost unchanged, signifying compositional replication.
In 1924, Russian biochemist Alexander Oparin claimed that life on Earth developed through gradual chemical changes of organic molecules in the “primordial soup” that likely existed here four billion years ago. In his view, the complex combination of lifeless molecules, joining forces within small oily droplets, could assume life faculties – self-replication, selection, and evolution. These ideas were received with considerable doubt, which remains today.
Nov 30, 2017...
A scallop with eyes arrayed on tentacles along the edge of its shell. Scientists have found that each eye contains two retinas receiving light from a unique mirroring system. Credit Ceri Jones/Haven Diving Services
It’s hard to see what’s so special about a scallop. It looks a lot like a clam, mussel or any other bivalve. Inside its hinged shell lurks a musclebound creature that’s best enjoyed seared in butter.
Jan 07, 2016... When you have a fever, your nose is stuffed and your headache is spreading to your toes, your body is telling you to stay home in bed. Feeling sick is an evolutionary adaptation, according to a hypothesis put forward by Prof. Guy Shakhar of the Weizmann Institute of Science’s Department of Immunology and Dr. Keren Shakhar of the Psychology Department of the College of Management Academic Studies, in a recent paper published in PLoS Biology.
Mar 11, 2019...
JERUSALEM, March 11 (Xinhua) – Israeli researchers have revealed the multilayered structure of the exoskeleton that covers the scorpions' pincers, which can lead to the creation of new synthetic materials, the Weizmann Institute of Science located in the center of the state published on Monday.
The researchers examined the sophisticated arrangements that have evolved to create these pincers, on the nanometer scale up to the level of millimeters.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/bacterial-immune-systems-take-the-stage/
Jan 25, 2018...
Bacteria like these have numerous defenses against the phages (dots) that infect them
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—January 25, 2018— Until a decade ago, scientists were not aware that bacteria had complex immune systems – ones that could keep up with the pace of evolution in viruses called phages that infect bacteria. That changed with the discovery of what is now the most famous bacterial immune mechanism: CRISPR. Scientists realized that CRISPR is a natural gene editor, and it has revolutionized the world of biological research in thousands of labs around the world. Researchers now understand that most microorganisms have sophisticated immune systems, of which CRISPR is just one element, but there has been no good way to identify these systems.
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