News tagged with cell membrane

A cell's first steps: Building a model to explain how cells grow

A collaboration between Lehigh University physicists and University of Miami biologists addresses an important fundamental question in basic cell biology: How do living cells figure out when and where to grow?

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created May 18, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

'Copper pump's' potential benefit in cancer treatment

(Phys.org) -- A team of University of California, San Diego researchers has made new discoveries about a copper-transporting protein in the membranes of human cells that drug-discovery scientists can co-opt ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created May 17, 2012 | popularity 4 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Research reveals novel transport mechanism for large ribonucleoproteins

The movement of genetic materials, such as RNA and ribosomes, from the nucleus to the cytoplasm is a critical component in a cell's ability to make the proteins necessary for essential biological functions. Until now, it ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created May 10, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Cell membrane is patterned like a patchwork quilt

(Phys.org) -- As the interface between the cell and its environment, the cell membrane, which consists of fats and proteins, fulfils a variety of vital functions. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created May 05, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (13) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Researchers present a shiny new tool for imaging biomolecules

At the heart of the immune system that protects our bodies from disease and foreign invaders is a vast and complex communications network involving millions of cells, sending and receiving chemical signals ...

Nanotechnology / Nanophysics

created Mar 23, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Unique salt allows energy production to move inland

Production of energy from the difference between salt water and fresh water is most convenient near the oceans, but now, using an ammonium bicarbonate salt solution, Penn State researchers can combine bacterial ...

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created Mar 01, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (15) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Envelope for an artificial cell

(PhysOrg.com) -- Chemists have taken an important step in making artificial life forms from scratch. Using a novel chemical reaction, they have created self-assembling cell membranes, the structural envelopes ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Jan 25, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (18) | comments 10 | with audio podcast

New insights on an old polymer material, Nafion, will enable design of better batteries

Designing new materials depends upon understanding the properties of today's materials. One such material, Nafion, is a polymer that efficiently conducts ions (a polymer electrolyte) and water through its ...

Chemistry / Polymers

created Jun 19, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

First macro-scale thin-film solid-oxide fuel cell demonstrated

(PhysOrg.com) -- Materials scientists at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and SiEnergy Systems LLC have demonstrated the first macro-scale thin-film solid-oxide fuel cell (SOFC).

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Apr 04, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (14) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

How plants sense touch, gravity and other physical forces

(PhysOrg.com) -- At the bottom of plants' ability to sense touch, gravity or a nearby trellis are mechanosensitive channels, pores through the cells' plasma membrane that are opened and closed by the deformation ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Oct 21, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (15) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Rapid, high-definition chemistry with new imaging technique

With intensity a million times brighter than sunlight, a new synchrotron-based imaging technique offers high-resolution pictures of the molecular composition of tissues with unprecedented speed and quality. ...

Chemistry / Analytical Chemistry

created Mar 20, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Nanoscale 'stealth' probe slides into cell walls seamlessly

A nanometer-scale probe designed to slip into a cell wall and fuse with it could offer researchers a portal for extended eavesdropping on the inner electrical activity of individual cells.

Nanotechnology / Bio & Medicine

created Apr 01, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (31) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Cornell researchers reveal structure of key protein

(PhysOrg.com) -- For the first time, researchers -- all Cornell scientists -- have characterized the structure of a protein that belongs to certain enzymes that are essential for proper functioning in all ...

Biology / Cell & Microbiology

created Apr 21, 2010 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Stanford researchers find electrical current stemming from plants

In an electrifying first, Stanford scientists have plugged in to algae cells and harnessed a tiny electric current. They found it at the very source of energy production - photosynthesis, a plant's method of converting sunlight ...

Nanotechnology / Bio & Medicine

created Apr 13, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (15) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

How many argon atoms can fit on the surface of a carbon nanotube?

(PhysOrg.com) -- Phase transitions -- changes of matter from one state to another without altering its chemical makeup -- are an important part of life in our three-dimensional world. Water falls to the ground as snow, melts ...

Nanotechnology / Nanomaterials

created Jan 28, 2010 | popularity 4 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Cell membrane

The cell membrane (also called the plasma membrane or plasmalemma) is the biological membrane separating the interior of a cell from the outside environment.

It is a semipermeable lipid bilayer found in all cells. It contains a wide variety of biological molecules, primarily proteins and lipids, which are involved in a vast array of cellular processes such as cell adhesion, ion channel conductance and cell signaling. The plasma membrane also serves as the attachment point for both the intracellular cytoskeleton and, if present, the extracellular cell wall.

For more information about Cell membrane, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Related topics: cells , protein , lipid , molecules , cancer cells