●Ras GTPases: integrins' friends or foes? Kinbara, K., Goldfinger, L. E., Hansen, M., Chou, F. -L. & Ginsberg, M. H. Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology October (2003)

●Cues for migration. Bernards, R. Nature September 18 (2003) This News and Views article discusses how lack of oxygen might trigger metastasis, by causing the activation of CXCR4 — a gene that causes tumour cells to home to specific organs.

●Taming transplantation with T cells. Sakaguchi, S. Nature Medicine September (2003) This News and Views article describes how combining donor-derived regulatory T cells with T-cell-depleted bone marrow might prevent graft-versus-host disease, but preserve tumour eradication.

●B cells under influence: transformation of B cells by Epstein–Barr virus. Küppers, R. Nature Reviews Immunology October (2003)

●Boosting p53 with interferons and viruses. Vilcek, J. Nature Immunology September (2003) This News and Views article explores the previously vague link between interferons — required for innate immune responses to viruses — and the tumour suppressor p53, and shows that interferons can induce transcription of the gene that encodes p53, with a resulting increase in the p53 protein.

●From developmental disorder to heritable cancer: it's all in the BMP/TGF-β family. Waite, K. A. & Eng, C. Nature Reviews Genetics October (2003)

●HIF-1 as a target for drug development. Giaccia, A., Siim, B. G. & Johnson, R. S. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery October (2003) This review article complements one by Gregg Semenza — Targeting HIF-1 for cancer therapy — in Nature Reviews Cancer this month, but also explores the use of targeting HIF-1 in other diseases such as heart disease and stroke.

●AAV display — homing in on the target. Lieber, A. Nature Biotechnology September (2003) One of the obstacles of gene therapy is achieving specificity and effective gene delivery. This News and Views article describes the development of new adeno-associated virus vectors that can specifically transduce a target cell type.