Biophysics articles within Nature

Featured

  • News Feature |

    Using techniques adapted from astronomy, physicists are finding ways to see through opaque materials such as living tissue.

    • Zeeya Merali

  • Article |

    An analysis of a bacterial homologue of the human glutamate transporter using single-molecule FRET and X-ray crystallography reveals that opening of the interface between its distinct transport and scaffold domains is rate determining for the transport cycle.

    • Nurunisa Akyuz
    • , Elka R. Georgieva
    •  & Scott C. Blanchard

  • Letter |

    Genome-wide association studies are used to identify common genetic variants that affect the structure of selected subcortical regions of the human brain; their identification provides insight into the causes of variability in brain development and may help to determine mechanisms of neuropsychiatric dysfunction.

    • Derrek P. Hibar
    • , Jason L. Stein
    •  & Sarah E. Medland

  • News & Views |

    Optogenetic techniques enable light-activated control of protein–protein interactions in the cell. This approach has now been used to alter membrane dynamics and induce cellular reorganization. See Letter p.111

    • Franck Perez

  • Letter |

    An optogenetic strategy allowing light-mediated recruitment of distinct cytoskeletal motor proteins to specific organelles is established; this technique enabled rapid and reversible activation or inhibition of the transport of organelles such as peroxisomes, recycling endosomes and mitochondria with high spatiotemporal accuracy, and the approach was also applied to primary neurons to demonstrate optical control of axonal growth by recycling endosome repositioning.

    • Petra van Bergeijk
    • , Max Adrian
    •  & Lukas C. Kapitein

  • News & Views |

    Molecular diffusion of some enzymes is enhanced when they catalyse reactions, but the reason for this was obscure. Dissipation of heat generated by catalysis through the protein is now thought to propel the molecules. See Letter p.227

    • A. Joshua Wand

  • Letter |

    It has been traditionally assumed that the heat released during a single enzymatic catalytic event does not perturb the enzyme in any way; however, here single-molecule fluorescence correlation spectroscopy is used to show that, for enzymes that catalyse chemical reactions with large reaction enthalpies, the heat released at the protein's active site during catalysis transiently displaces the protein's centre-of-mass, essentially giving rise to a recoil effect that propels the enzyme.

    • Clement Riedel
    • , Ronen Gabizon
    •  & Carlos Bustamante

  • Letter |

    The radiation-damage-free structure of the photosystem II membrane protein complex, which oxidizes water into dioxygen in an oxygen evolving complex, has been determined by an X-ray free electron laser at a resolution of 1.95 Å; one of the substrate oxygen atoms in this reaction is now identified.

    • Michihiro Suga
    • , Fusamichi Akita
    •  & Jian-Ren Shen

  • Letter |

    Short carbon nanotubes spontaneously insert into lipid bilayers and live cell membranes to form channels with useful and tunable transport properties that make them a promising biomimetic nanopore platform for developing cell interfaces, studying nanofluidic transport in biological channels, and creating stochastic sensors.

    • Jia Geng
    • , Kyunghoon Kim
    •  & Aleksandr Noy

  • Brief Communications Arising |

    • Heping Cheng
    • , Wang Wang
    •  & Meng-Qiu Dong

  • Brief Communications Arising |

    • Mei-ling A. Joiner
    • , Olha M. Koval
    •  & Mark E. Anderson

  • Letter |

    Single-molecular-interaction-sequencing involves attaching DNA barcodes to proteins, assaying these barcoded proteins en masse in an aqueous solution, followed by immobilization in a polyacrylamide film and amplifying and analysing the barcoding DNAs—the method allows for precise protein quantification and simultaneous interrogation of molecular binding affinity and specificity.

    • Liangcai Gu
    • , Chao Li
    •  & George M. Church

  • Letter |

    To prime reverse transcription of Moloney murine leukaemia virus, a transfer RNA molecule must bind two regions of the retroviral RNA, the primer binding site (PBS) and primer activation signal within the U5-PBS; here, the NMR structures of the U5-PBS RNA and tRNA primer are solved, with and without the retroviral nucleocapsid protein, which remodels these regions.

    • Sarah B. Miller
    • , F. Zehra Yildiz
    •  & Victoria M. D’Souza

  • Letter |

    The inherent stochasticity in metabolic reactions is a potent source of phenotypic heterogeneity in cell populations, with potentially fundamental implications for cancer research.

    • Daniel J. Kiviet
    • , Philippe Nghe
    •  & Sander J. Tans

  • News |

    Industry and academia invest in treating diseases by delivering electrical charges to nerves.

    • Sara Reardon

  • Article |

    Metastatic cancer cells are shown to have a tendency towards forming a bulky glycocalyx owing to the production of large glycoproteins, and this cancer-associated glycocalyx has a mechanical effect on the spatial organization of integrins — by funnelling integrins into adhesions, integrin clustering and signalling is promoted, which leads to enhanced cell survival and proliferation.

    • Matthew J. Paszek
    • , Christopher C. DuFort
    •  & Valerie M. Weaver

  • Letter |

    To investigate the mechanism of frameshifting during messenger RNA translation, a technique was developed to monitor translation of single molecules in real time using Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET); ribosomes were revealed to pause tenfold longer than usual during elongation at the frameshifting sites.

    • Jin Chen
    • , Alexey Petrov
    •  & Joseph D. Puglisi

  • News & Views |

    Weak radio waves in the medium-wave band are sufficient to disrupt geomagnetic orientation in migratory birds, according to a particularly well-controlled study. But the underlying biophysics remains a puzzle. See Letter p.353

    • Joseph L. Kirschvink

  • Letter |

    This study shows how the yeast Ctf4 protein couples the DNA helicase, Cdc45–MCM–GINS, to DNA polymerase α — the GINS subunit of the helicase and the polymerase use a similar interaction to bind Ctf4, suggesting that, as Ctf4 is a trimer, two polymerases could be simultaneously coupled to a single helicase during lagging-strand synthesis.

    • Aline C. Simon
    • , Jin C. Zhou
    •  & Luca Pellegrini

  • News & Views |

    A tour de force of X-ray scattering has yielded structures of a phytochrome photoreceptor in its dark and illuminated states, showing how localized protein refolding magnifies a light signal to form a cellular message. See Letter p.245

    • Anna W. Baker
    •  & Katrina T. Forest

  • Letter |

    The solution and crystal structures of a bacterial phytochrome photosensory core in both its resting and activated states are determined; switching between closed (resting) and open (activated) forms is found to be mediated by a conserved ‘tongue’, and the structures indicate that smaller changes in the vicinity of the chromophore are amplified in scale as they are transmitted through the tongue and beyond.

    • Heikki Takala
    • , Alexander Björling
    •  & Sebastian Westenhoff

  • News |

    High-speed video reveals unusually powerful motion, but specialized weapon can also gently nudge prey.

    • Chelsea Wald

  • Review Article |

    Allostery is the process by which biological macromolecules transmit the effect of binding at one site to another, often distal, functional site, allowing for the regulation of activity; here facilitation of allostery through dynamic and intrinsically disordered proteins is discussed, and a framework to unify the description of allosteric mechanisms for different systems is proposed.

    • Hesam N. Motlagh
    • , James O. Wrabl
    •  & Vincent J. Hilser

  • News & Views |

    Ribosomes, the cell's protein-synthesis machines, are assembled from their components in a defined order. It emerges that the first assembly step must overcome dynamic structural rearrangements. See Article p.334

    • Kathleen B. Hall

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