●Bioinformatics goes back to the future. Miller, C. J. & Attwood, T. K. Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology February (2003). This Perspective describes how lessons from cryptography and artificial intelligence might help us understand the changes that are occurring in bioinformatics and to predict the field's future directions.

●Evolution and the egg. Wolpert, L. & Szathmáry, E. Nature 19/26 December (2002) A Commentary arguing that development from a single egg cell might have been an essential step in the evolution of diversity of multicellular organisms.

●Cre-constructing the heart. Ruiz-Lozano, P. & Chien, K. R. Nature Genetics January (2003) A News and Views article that discusses the challenges and opportunities for research into heart development and disease.

●Human therapeutic proteins from silkworms. Wurm, F. M. Nature Biotechnology January (2003) Following the recent report of transgenic worms generating human type III procollagen, this News and Views article highlights the potential for using silkworms to produce recombinant proteins.

●A genetic hierarchy controlling cell polarity. Johnson, K. & Wodarz, A. Nature Cell Biology January (2003) This News and Views article describes our present understanding of gene interactions involved in apico-basal polarization of epithelial cells.

●Decoding the literature on genetic variation. Coronini, R., de Looze, M. -A., Puget, P., Bley, G. & Ramani, S. V. Nature Biotechnology January (2003) The authors of this Feature analyse the patent and scientific literature on human SNPs that might facilitate improvements in medical treatment.

●The double helix – 50 years. A supplement to the 23 January issue of Nature that celebrates the discovery of the structure of DNA 50 years ago. The original papers reporting the structure of DNA have been reprinted and are accompanied by a broad collection of articles that discuss the impact of this finding on science and society, including:

●Nature, nurture and human disease. Chakravarti, A. & Little, P.

●Controlling the double helix. Felsenfeld, G. & Groudine, M.

●The Mona Lisa of modern science. Kemp, M.

●The mosaic that is our genome. Pääbo, S.

●The digital code of DNA. Hood, L. & Groudine, M.

●DNA in a material world. Seeman, N. C.

●DNA damage and repair. Friedberg, E. C.