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.
The cover shows the airways of the bronchus of a patient suffering from cystic fibrosis. The airways are lined with hair like cilia (dark blue, purple) which normally clear bacteria and mucus (yellow) from the lungs. In cystic fibrosis, mucus accumulates and life-threatening infections develop. On p. 47, Liu and colleagues use RNA trans-splicing to attempt to correct one of the underlying genetic mutations. Scanning electron micrograph by Jergen Burger, Max Planck Institute, Science Photo Library.
As bioterrorism becomes a reality, US federal agencies are turning to biotechnology for new means of detection and safer therapeutics. But does the industry have all the answers?
Random transposon mutagenesis, microarray analysis, and genome-wide homology searches have been used to identify 137 previously non-annotated genes in yeast.
As the only palindromic year this century stands before you, the editors of Nature Biotechnology have attempted to recall something of the preceding 12 months. While the questions below and answers opposite certainly reflect our particular perspective on biotechnology, we hope they retain something of the spirit of 2001.