For a stem cell, the future is wide open. It can divide infinitely to create more stem cells, or it can grow up into other kinds of cells, taking its place in the heart, brain, or other organs. But the stem cell loses something ...
Cell & Microbiology
Mar 30, 2018
0
129
Death is certain for all living things, including the body's cells. The act of dying is in fact as sophisticated as any process a cell might perform during its lifetime—and when glitches in cell death occur, they can lead ...
Cell & Microbiology
Mar 19, 2018
0
31
Like an island nation, the nucleus of a cell has a transportation problem. Evolution has enclosed it with a double membrane, the nuclear envelope, which protects DNA but also cuts it off from the rest of the cell. Nature's ...
Cell & Microbiology
Mar 15, 2018
0
126
All of the proteins necessary for life are made by giant molecular machines called ribosomes. A ribosome, in turn, is built from proteins and ribosomal RNAs stitched together with immaculate precision.
Cell & Microbiology
Mar 12, 2018
0
28
Put 50 newborn worms in 50 separate containers, and they'll all start looking for food at roughly the same time. Like members of other species, microscopic C. elegans roundworms tend to act like other individuals their own ...
Cell & Microbiology
Feb 16, 2018
2
459
If you thought the sex lives of humans were complicated, consider the case of the female Aedes aegypti mosquito, bringer of Zika, dengue, and yellow fever: She mates but once, in seconds and on the wing, with one lucky male; ...
Plants & Animals
Dec 13, 2017
0
190
For millions of years, humans and viruses have engaged in a constant tug of war: as our cells evolve new ways to defend us from our viral enemies, these pathogens in turn acquire new traits to sidestep those defenses.
Cell & Microbiology
Nov 13, 2017
0
73
Most drugs that fight viruses are designed to target individual pathogens. But scientists at The Rockefeller University have identified a protein that a broad range of viruses require to spread within a host—a discovery ...
Cell & Microbiology
Nov 8, 2017
0
18
We have a symbiotic relationship with the trillions of bacteria that live in our bodies—they help us, we help them. It turns out that they even speak the same language. And new research from The Rockefeller University and ...
Cell & Microbiology
Aug 30, 2017
0
46
In the bacterial world, as in the larger one, beauty can be fleeting. When swimming together with just the right amount of vigor, masses of bacterial cells produce whirling, hypnotic patterns. Too much vigor, however, and ...
General Physics
May 16, 2017
0
106
