Microscopic images of human tissue are a cornerstone of biomedical research and clinical diagnostics. Yet despite their importance, these images often remain difficult to analyze systematically and to ...

A simulated cell in the early stages of division. Left half shows membrane (green cubes), and ribosomes (yellow/purple) interwoven through in the cell’s chromosome (red). Right side shows all the ...

Music is layered, emotional, and complex. Translating it into written form used to mean endless replaying and second-guessing. Music is messy. Beautiful, messy, layered sound. A recording captures ...

According to the RNA world hypothesis, life began when RNA molecules evolved the ability to make more copies of themselves. Now we have discovered an RNA molecule that is almost capable of this – it ...

From vaccines and diagnostics to emerging gene-based therapies, RNA molecules are now central to modern medicine. But as their use continues to grow, so does a fundamental challenge: producing RNA ...

When a gene is active, there is cellular machinery that transcribes the sequence of that gene from DNA into messenger RNA. This is a fundamental cellular process that is essential to the proper ...

A giant impact on the early Earth could have brought the building blocks of RNA to our planet, which new research suggests could have quickly formed in the presence of compounds called borates. When ...

How much of our genome really matters? Some argue that because most of our DNA is active, it must be doing something important. Others say even random DNA would be highly active. This has now been put ...

Research into how a father’s choices — such as diet, exercise, stress, nicotine use — may transfer traits to his children has become impossible to ignore. The standard sperm-meets-egg story posits ...

A new study has uncovered a previously overlooked hotspot for mutations at the starting points of human genes. These regions mutate far more often than expected, especially during the earliest stages ...

Life's instructions are written in DNA, but it is the enzyme RNA polymerase II (Pol II) that reads the script, transcribing RNA in eukaryotic cells and eventually giving rise to proteins. Scientists ...

Researchers have discovered new regions of the human genome particularly vulnerable to mutations. These altered stretches of DNA can be passed down to future generations and are important for how we ...