Volume 6 Issue 11, November 2009

A new in vivo imaging strategy produces detailed maps of tumor microvasculature and lymphatic vessels without injected labels.

By monitoring the size-dependence of particle distribution in the lamellipodium, fluid flow in moving cells can be measured.

With a modified polymerase and optimized oligonucleotide chemistry, Helicos' single-molecule sequencer takes on RNA.

Researchers use atomic force microscopy to image the chemical structure of the small molecule pentacene, with atomic resolution.

Certain yeast previously assumed to lack RNA interference machinery instead have alternative enzyme variants, which can in turn be transplanted to truly deficient species.

A cocktail of three small molecules improves the efficiency of reprogramming human fibroblasts to induced pluripotent stem cells and allows survival of the cells after trypsinization.

Glycan structure, attachment site and the glycoprotein from which it came can be identified with a method to enrich for glycoproteins from complex biological samples, digest them on a bead and release the glycopeptides for mass spectrometry analysis.

Activity of yeast cytosine deaminase can be both positively and negatively selected by adjusting growth conditions. Adapting this life-death selection to a protein complementation assay based on the enzyme allows dissection of protein-protein interactions and protein functions in yeast.

Protein complexes can be detected, counted and localized within the bacterium Leptospira interrogans by combining quantitative mass spectrometry–based proteomics analysis with cryo-electron tomography, with the aid of an improved template-matching method.

Engineered splicing factors, consisting of an RNA recognition motif and a functional splicing module, can target a specific mRNA sequence and activate or suppress splicing of endogenous mRNAs.

Optically trapping an individual E. coli cell allows the long-term quantification of bacterial swimming phenotype: the stochastic transitions between 'running' and 'tumbling' as well as changes in swimming speed and direction.

Chromatin conformation capture on chip, or 4C, a technique developed to investigate the interaction of one chromosomal region with the rest of the chromatin, can also provide high resolution mapping of translocations and inversions in selected chromosomal regions.

A combination of forward and reverse two hybrid screening allows systematic identification of 'edgetic' or edge-specific alleles, which encode proteins that have lost a single physical interaction but for which other interactions remain unperturbed.

Antibodies, the molecular workhorses of protein research, have traditionally been one of the most difficult reagents to procure. Using innovative new technologies, though, a burgeoning antibody production industry is turning these molecules into commodities.