Magazine

Highlighting the latest research and giving a voice to scientists
Illustration by Davide Bonazzi

Highlights

Highlights controls:

Latest articles

    1. Cell Biology

    Skeletal Muscle: The origin of T-tubules

    Callum J Quinn, Katharine M Dibb
    Ring-like structures made up of caveolae appear to drive the development of membrane invaginations called T-tubules which are important for muscle contraction.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Neuroscience
    2. Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine

    Brain Development: The dangers of rubella virus

    Ekaterina Epifanova, Laurent Nguyen
    The rubella virus can interfere with fetal brain development by infecting immune cells called microglia during pregnancy.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Microbiology and Infectious Disease

    Parasite Communication: Learning the language of pathogens

    Izadora Volpato Rossi, Marcel Ivan Ramirez
    Parasites can use extracellular vesicles and cellular projections called cytonemes to communicate with one another.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Cell Biology
    2. Physics of Living Systems

    Cell Size: Putting scaling laws on a physical foundation

    Yiyang Ye, Jie Lin
    As a cell changes size during the cell cycle, why does its density remain constant?
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Evolutionary Biology

    Palaeontology: Sexual dimorphism in dinosaurs

    Stella A Ludwig, Roy E Smith, Nizar Ibrahim
    Studying fossils from a mass-mortality event reveals evidence for sexual dimorphism and, unusually, equal numbers of males and females in a herd of dinosaurs.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Biochemistry and Chemical Biology
    2. Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics

    Nuclear Receptors: Alternative activation

    Kristen Young, Sean Fanning
    A detailed study of the orphan receptor Nurr1, a regulator implicated in neurodegenerative diseases, reveals a new way for ligands to control their transcriptional activity.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Chromosomes and Gene Expression

    Gene Expression: Listen and learn

    Sarah E London
    In songbirds, deafening leads to changes in gene expression which have now been mapped at the single-cell level across the neural circuit involved in song production.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
  1. Episode 87: May 2023

    In this episode, we hear about ways to combat online misinformation, what fish reveal about fighting infections, the eating habits of bats, plumage patterns in birds, and how spiders came by their venoms.
    1. Microbiology and Infectious Disease

    Growth: Inside help from the microbiome

    Sneha Agrawal, Nichole A Broderick
    Elucidating the role of one of the proteins produced by Lactiplantibacillus plantarum reveals a new molecule that allows this gut bacterium to support the development of fruit fly larvae.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF
    1. Biochemistry and Chemical Biology
    2. Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics

    Drug Discovery: Decoding the mechanisms of allostery

    Saif Khan, Cornelius Gati
    A complex interplay between structure, conformational dynamics and pharmacology defines distant regulation of G protein-coupled receptors.
    Insight
    Formats available:
    • HTML
    • PDF