Papers from the literature selected by the Nature Biotechnology editors. (Follow us on Twitter, @NatureBiotech #nbtHighlight)

Cerebral organoids model human brain development and microcephaly

Lancaster, M. et al. Nature doi:10.1038/nature12517.html (28 August 2013)

RNAi screens in mice identify physiological regulators of oncogenic growth

Beronja, S. et al. Nature doi:10.1038/nature12464.html (14 August 2013)

Design and characterization of synthetic fungal-bacterial consortia for direct production of isobutanol from cellulosic biomass

Minty, J. et al. PNAS 110, 14592–14597 (2013)

Double nicking by RNA-guided CRISPR Cas9 for enhanced genome editing specificity

Rann, F.A. et al. Cell 154, 1380–1389 (2013)

A neo-substrate that amplifies catalytic activity of Parkinson's-disease-related kinase PINK1

Hertz, N.T. et al. Cell 154, 737–747 (2013)