Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Volume 15 Issue 6, June 2008

Biophysical studies from Spudich and colleagues suggest that a rigid α-helix in the tail domain of myosin-VI may contribute to its large step size. The black-necked stilt shown here also has a long stride. Photo by Frank Leung for iStockphoto.com. pp 591-597

Volume 15 Issue 6

Subscribe

Editorial

  • Green tea has held a long-standing place in traditional Asian medicine. Scientific research is now beginning to explain why.

    Editorial

    Advertisement

Top of page ⤴

News & Views

  • New work shows that activation of the Ras guanine nucleotide exchange factor SOS is dependent upon the membrane density of phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate (PIP2) and GTP-bound Ras. These signals synergize to release the autoinhibitory DH-PH domain, while the histone domain fine-tunes SOS activation in response to PIP2.

    • Greg M Findlay
    • Tony Pawson
    News & Views

  • Crystal structures of the Nipah and Hendra virus attachment protein complexed with ephrin-B2 shed light on the apparent paradox of ephrin-B2's flexibility for binding multiple receptors. Surprisingly, the switch from the use of glycan-based to protein-based receptors seems to have evolved independently from other protein-receptor–using paramyxoviruses such as the measles virus.

    • Benhur Lee
    • Zeynep Akyol Ataman
    • Lei Jin
    News & Views

  • Methylated lysines are essential components of the network of histone modifications, or 'histone code', that regulates gene expression. Work on the methyltransferase Dot1 shows how modifications on different histones interact to modulate activity and how its catalytic mechanism is matched to its role in genome regulation.

    • Bryan M Turner
    News & Views

  • Small molecules that safely antagonize amyloidogenesis are desperately needed for many devastating disorders that plague humankind, including Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. New work brings important mechanistic insights into how one promising candidate, (−)-epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG), diverts amyloid-β and α-synuclein down innocuous folding trajectories at the expense of the deleterious states populated during amyloidogenesis.

    • Blake E Roberts
    • James Shorter
    News & Views

  • Organisms possessing RNA-dependent RNA polymerase activity are known to produce endogenous small interfering RNAs (esiRNAs). It had been thought that organisms such as flies and mammals lacking this activity would not produce esiRNAs. However, it has now been shown that a functional esiRNA pathway is present in such animals; the esiRNAs are derived from a variety of endogenous double-stranded RNA substrates.

    • Timothy W Nilsen
    News & Views
Top of page ⤴

Research Highlights

Top of page ⤴

Article

Top of page ⤴

Erratum

Top of page ⤴

Corrigendum

Top of page ⤴

Search

Advanced search

Quick links