All articles starting with M
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Melanie Phillips
Melanie Phillips (born 1951, London) is a British journalist, broadcaster and author, formerly of the Guardian and New Society, a Daily Mail columnist from 2001, now in The Times and JNS, Orwell Prize winner (1996) and author of Londonistan (2006).
Melanie S. Sanford
Melanie S. Sanford is an American organometallic and inorganic chemist who has spent her career at the University of Michigan, known for palladium-catalyzed C–H functionalization, new fluorination chemistry, and electrolytes for redox-flow batteries.
Melanie Scheible
Melanie Scheible is an American Democratic politician and attorney representing Nevada Senate District 9 since 2018, serving as Chief Majority Whip and Judiciary chair after working as a Clark County prosecutor.
Melanie Schnell
Melanie Schnell is a German physical chemist at Kiel University and DESY who studies rotational spectroscopy of cold molecules and microwave detection of molecular chirality.
Melanie Smith
Melanie Smith, also Melanie Smith Taylor (born 1949), American show jumper; 1984 Olympic team gold on Calypso, 1982 World Cup champion, and the only rider to win the US show jumping Triple Crown on one horse.
Melanie Stansbury
Melanie Stansbury, also known as Melanie A. Stansbury, is an American Democrat who has represented New Mexico's 1st Congressional District in the U.S. House since 2021.
Melanie Sykes
Melanie Sykes (born 1970) is an English TV presenter and former model, the face of Boddingtons Bitter ads, co-host of Today with Des and Mel, and voice of the 2017 Blind Date revival; diagnosed autistic in 2021, she left TV and later revealed alopecia.
Melanie Thornton
Melanie Janene Thornton, American singer (1967-2001) based in Germany, lead vocalist of Eurodance duo La Bouche with Lane McCray on "Sweet Dreams" and "Be My Lover"; died in Crossair Flight 3597 crash near Zurich while promoting her solo album Ready to Fly.
Melanie Valerio
Melanie Valerio (Melanie M. Valerio-Thomas), American swimmer born 1969 in Cleveland, Ohio; 1996 Atlanta Olympic gold medalist in the 4x100 m freestyle relay, 1998 world champion, four-time Pan Pacific relay gold medalist, and later Ironman triathlete.
Melanie Ward
Melanie Ward, Scottish Labour MP for Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy since July 2024 and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Scotland Office since 22 July 2026; former CEO of Medical Aid for Palestinians and Time100 Health honoree.
Melanie Watson Bernhardt
Melanie Watson Bernhardt (1968-2025), American actress born with osteogenesis imperfecta, played Kathy Gordon in four Diff'rent Strokes episodes (1981-1984), then founded the service-dog nonprofit Train Rite; died in Colorado Springs.
Melanin
Melanin: group of dark biological pigments (eumelanin, pheomelanin, neuromelanin, allomelanin) made by melanocytes from tyrosine via tyrosinase; gives skin, hair, and eye color, absorbs UV, refractive index about 1.8 to 2.0, optical gap about 0.5 eV.
Melanin biosynthesis
Melanin biosynthesis (melanogenesis): melanocytes make eumelanin and pheomelanin from tyrosine via tyrosinase in melanosomes; cysteine availability sets the eumelanin-to-pheomelanin ratio.
Melanin theory
Melanin theory, an Afrocentric pseudoscience also called melanism, claims black people have superior mental and paranormal powers from extra melanin; refuted because neuromelanin levels are independent of skin color.
Melanin-concentrating hormone
Melanin-concentrating hormone (MCH) is a cyclic neuropeptide produced mainly in the hypothalamus that regulates feeding behavior, metabolism, and sleep-wake rhythms, and is a target for obesity drugs.
Melanin-concentrating hormone receptor
Melanin-concentrating hormone receptors (MCHR1, MCHR2; SLC-1) are GPCRs binding hypothalamic MCH, regulating feeding, energy balance, sleep, and mood; MCHR2 is a rodent pseudogene.
Melanism
Melanism: unusually dark coloration relative to a species' typical form, from excess melanin. Famous as industrial melanism in the peppered moth Biston betularia, carbonaria, a textbook case of natural selection.
Melanitta
Melanitta, the scoters, is a genus of sea ducks (Anatidae) of northern coasts; species include Common, Black, Velvet, White-winged, Stejneger's, and Surf Scoter, with Velvet Scoter IUCN Vulnerable and Surf Scoter Least Concern.
Melanitta fusca
Melanitta fusca, the Velvet Scoter (also White-winged Scoter in North America, now M. deglandi), is a Vulnerable black sea duck of the Baltic and boreal Eurasia; global population 141,000-268,000, declining about 60% in the Baltic since the 1990s.
Melanitta nigra
The common scoter (Melanitta nigra) is a sea duck in the family Anatidae that breeds in northern Europe, western Siberia, and Greenland and winters in coastal flocks.
Melanoblast
Melanoblast: unpigmented neural crest-derived precursor of melanocytes. Marked by KIT and MITF; migrates dorsolaterally in the embryo; EDN3/EDNRB and Kitl signaling control its survival, migration, and differentiation.
Melanocortin-2 receptor accessory protein family
MRAP family (MRAP1/MRAP, MRAP2): single-transmembrane GPCR accessory proteins. MRAP1 enables the adrenal ACTH receptor; MRAP2 regulates energy homeostasis, with mutations causing glucocorticoid deficiency or obesity.
Melanocyte
Melanocyte: pigment-producing cell of the skin and eyes, neural crest-derived, making melanin in melanosomes and transferring it to keratinocytes; lost in vitiligo and albinism, cancerous in melanoma.
Melanocyte stimulating hormone secreting cell
Melanocyte stimulating hormone secreting cell, also called melanotrope or melanotroph, is the POMC-expressing endocrine cell of the pituitary intermediate lobe that secretes alpha-MSH and beta-endorphin under dopaminergic control.
Melanocyte-stimulating hormone
Melanocyte-stimulating hormone (MSH; melanotropin): α-, β-, and γ-MSH peptides cleaved from POMC in the pituitary and hypothalamus; they drive melanin synthesis via MC1R, act through MC1R/MC3R/MC4R/MC5R but not MC2R, and regulate pigmentation, feeding, and inflammation.
Melanocytic nevus
Melanocytic nevus (mole, pigmented nevus): benign skin lesion from local melanocyte proliferation, congenital (about 1% of births) or acquired; BRAF/NRAS driver mutations, very low per-mole melanoma transformation risk, ABCD warning signs.
Melanoleuca
Melanoleuca (cavalier toadstools) is a worldwide genus of brownish, white-spored agaric fungi with amyloid warted spores, formerly in Tricholomataceae but molecularly placed near Pluteaceae; two subgenera, Urticocystis and Melanoleuca, with difficult species identification.
Melanoleuca melaleuca
Melanoleuca melaleuca, the type species of the cavalier mushroom genus Melanoleuca (Tricholomataceae), a grey-brown grassland agaric; basionym Agaricus melaleucus Pers. 1801, separated from M. polioleuca only microscopically.
Melanoma
Melanoma, also called malignant melanoma, is a cancer of melanocytes, the pigment cells of the skin, eye, or mucosa; defined by ABCDE warning signs, BRAF mutations in about 60% of cases, and modern checkpoint-inhibitor and targeted therapy.
Melanoma and neural system tumor syndrome
Melanoma and neural system tumor syndrome (melanoma-astrocytoma syndrome, ORPHA:252206, OMIM 155755) is an extremely rare autosomal dominant CDKN2A (9p21.3) predisposition syndrome combining cutaneous melanoma and neural tumors, typically astrocytoma.