News & Comment

Cell quiescence dampens mTOR signalling and enables AGO2 localization to the nucleus, where it suppresses retrotransposons by directly cleaving their RNA.

In this Comment, Hub Zwart discusses the importance of embedding philosophical reflection into research aiming at creating a synthetic cell.

Florian Heyd describes a paper that pointed towards alternative splicing as a driver of human cognitive abilities.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Manuela Richter (Dumont lab) describes a method to probe mechanisms of cytoskeletal network re-organization that uses a targeted laser to both trigger network remodelling and track network dynamics.

Emily Wong describes a study that provided a quantitative methodology for analyzing ChIP experiments and shifted our understanding of the functionality of transcription factors.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Bohan Zhang (Gladyshev lab) discusses how the use of extended heterochronic parabiosis in mice (surgical connection between circulatory systems for an extended period), followed by detachment, can shed light on potential mechanisms that reverse mammalian ageing.

Yu et al. identify senescent cells as important players in the regeneration of complex structures.

Phosphorylation of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) maintenance factor TFAM during spermatogenesis prevents its import into mitochondria, resulting in elimination of paternal mtDNA and leading to maternal inheritance.

Ernst and Renne highlight two papers, one that discovered and another that structurally defined the ER–mitochondria encounter structure (ERMES) that facilitates the exchange of lipids between the ER and mitochondria.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Christine Lim and Alicia González Díaz (Vendruscolo lab) describe a pipeline for the identification and characterization of proteins whose phase separation is altered in disease.

mTOR inhibition by deprivation of the amino acids Tyr, Trp and Phe promotes the translocation of the 26S proteasome from the nucleus to the cytosol, which is required for stress tolerance and cell survival.

Sarkar et al. identify a feedback loop between the methyltransferase SETDB1 and nuclear pore complexes that ensures silencing of early-oogenesis genes as oocyte specification progresses.

Congratulations to John Jumper and Demis Hassabis for winning the 2023 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award.

In this Tools of the Trade article, Sarah Paramore (from the Devenport and Nelson labs) discusses the use of mouse strains carrying genomic alterations in PCP genes and how they can increase our understanding of mammalian planar cell polarity.

Two papers published in 1991 established a new class of human genetic disorders, caused by expansion of simple DNA repeats.

The first study to show, in C. elegans, that sensory neurons have a role in lifespan regulation.

Antennapedia proteins were among the first proteins found to be exchanged intercellularly. This discovery by Alain Prochiantz and colleagues has inspired researchers of various backgrounds.

Liang et al. show that mitochondria can be expelled from cells via extracellular vesicles as a route of quality control that is an alternative to lysosomal degradation.

Bulut-Karslıoğlu remembers the publication of two seminal papers that described bivalent chromatin and how this discovery continues to affect research to this day.

To activate noncanonical LC3B lipidation and NLRP3 inflammasome formation, stimulator of interferon genes (STING) forms a proton channel in Golgi membranes.