Small Things Considered

Gleanings – Genome Synthesized by Scientists. So What?

by Miguel Vicente  
It's in the news! The genome of Mycoplasma genitalium has been synthesized! Once again, Craig Venter’s group makes headlines. The excitement reminds me of a similar occasion — the day almost eleven years ago when the existence of Dolly, the first cloned sheep, was made public. Read more →

Pathogen On Board (River Blindness)

by Elio  
River blindness is a dreadful disease — the leading cause of blindness in tropical areas of the world. Its effects devastate the lives of entire villages. It has long been associated with infection by the filarial nematode, Onchocerca volvulus. The scarring of the cornea that leads to blindness was assumed... Read more →

Talmudic Question #27

Do all genes have some homology with others? If all are derived from the genome of LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor), the answer is easy. But, to start an argument, what if... Read more →

Seeing Double Is Believing

by Elio  
If you've ever longed to take a high resolution look at a bacterium in a biofilm under physiological conditions and to identify the cells at the same time, here is your chance. Technically-skilled researchers at the universities of Duisburg and Mannheim in Germany have successfully married two techniques, atomic force microscopy (AFM) and fluorescence microscopy (FM), so that... Read more →

Subtle Bacillus subtilis

by Elio  
When Bacillus subtilis sporulates, the cell destined to make a spore divides asymmetrically; one cell, the “forespore,” becomes the spore; the other, a short-lived sacrificial “mother cell.” You’d expect that a nucleoid would be partitioned between these two compartments before they even think of dividing. Not so. Cell division and chromosome segregation get out of sync and... Read more →

Prochlorococci to the Head of the Class

by Merry Youle  
Since their discovery in 1988, cyanobacteria of the genus Prochlorococcus have been making up for lost time, going from unknown organism to favored research subject. They are the smallest photosynthetic organisms known (0.5–0.8 micron in diameter), yet they represent 40% to 50% of the phytoplankton biomass in nutrient-poor (oligotrophic) regions of the oceans... Read more →

Lost City Ramblings

by Elio  
While exploring the Mid-Atlantic Ridge in 2000, a research submarine traveled 15 km west towards the dome-like Atlantis Massif. Here its crew encountered tall underwater structures that resembled glistening white cathedral spires. The area was dubbed the Lost City hydrothermal field. Some of the towers were 30 to 60 meters tall... Read more →

Talmudic Question #26

Given that hardly anything in biology is more central yet more elusive than the concept of species, can you conceive of a way to portray evolutionary history that is not based on the species concept? Read more →

¡Atención Hispanoparlantes!

Por primera vez, un articulo de este blog ha sido traducido al castellano (un idioma que Elio maneja). Vease... Read more →

Protein Origami

by Merry Youle  
Prions are proteins of ill repute, as they keep company with "mad cow disease," Alzheimer's, and other neuro­degenerative maladies. But prions are not foreign pathogens; they are alternative states of normal cellular proteins. Proteins behaving as prions typically assume a characteristic ß-sheet secondary structure and aggregate to form exceptionally stable fibers called amyloids. Small amyloid aggregates can... Read more →