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25 January 2024 An oval light blue shape. In the central part, there is a smaller a red object, from which stem many highly branched smaller canals that cover a significant part of the blue surface. The whole sponge image is in placed in a circle. The background around the circle is blue-green.

Ancient ‘relaxant-inflammatory’ response gets sponges moving

Sponges lack muscles and neurons. Yet, they make coordinated movements. Scientists at EMBL Heidelberg have discovered that sponge movement is controlled by an ancient ‘relaxant-inflammatory’ response that is also present in vertebrate blood vessels. The findings shed light on sponge physiology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2024

sciencescience-technology

21 December 2023 On the left: image of a protein complex in a shape of a yellow doughnut with blue elements. Above it is a drawing of nucleic acid with arrows connecting nitrogenous bases to different points in the protein complex. On the right: a line with peaks indicating the peaks recorded in mass spectrometry. Above two peaks, there are smaller depictions of the doughnut-shaped complex, one with a blue element and one without.

RNA to rule them all

The Kosinski Group at EMBL Hamburg collaborated with other groups in Hamburg to reveal critical steps in Lassa virus ribonucleoparticle assembly and recruitment, and the crucial role played by RNA in in the Lassa virus life cycle.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

19 December 2023 Cartoon showing nanoparticles on a conveyer belt passing through a machine. They are ordered by size and the smallest one pass through the machine before the bigger ones. A ray of light enters the machine, where a nanoparticle is being scanned, and leaves it on the other side. A monitor on top of the scanning machine shows an X-ray of a nanoparticle.

‘X-ray vision’ for investigation of mRNA nanomedicines

EMBL Hamburg, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Postnova Analytics GmbH, and BioNTech SE have developed a new method to quantitatively investigate sizes of nanoparticles containing mRNA. It may become an important part of regular characterisation of mRNA nanomedicines in the future.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

16 November 2023

New evidence on retinal function

A new study from the Asari group at EMBL Rome shows a different retinal function in awake mice compared to isolated retinal samples. These new insights could help to develop prosthetic devices that can act as a retina in the future.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

5 October 2023 A composite image of four 3D micrographs showing the cellular organelles of a phytoplankton marked in different colours.

Spotlight: Seeing into the seas

A new method developed by EMBL scientists can help us identify and investigate plankton species in field samples with greater speed, accuracy, and resolution than ever possible before.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

2 October 2023 Outline of a human, purple against red background. Red RNA strand in the background, electrocardiogram across the image. On the right, outline of a Nobel prize medal.

mRNA nanomedicines scoop Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Pioneers of the mRNA nanomedicines technology receive 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or medicine. EMBL is pleased to have supported the development of the application of the mRNA nanomedicine technology through our long-standing collaboration with BioNTech, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

28 September 2023 Visual of AlphaFold Protein prediction, embedded into a visual of scientific data

EMBL receives German AI prize

EMBL receives the German AI prize awarded for outstanding services to the research and development as well as application and commercialisation of artificial intelligence (AI) in life science research.

EMBL ANNOUNCEMENTS

2023

embl-announcementsscience

15 September 2023

Switching off the cytokine storm

EMBL Grenoble and University of Geneva researchers shed light on the molecular activation of the MAP kinase p38α, the final ‘switch’ triggering the inflammatory response.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

6 September 2023 A drawing of swordfish and a bubble containing a drawing of a molecular model. Both on blue background representing water.

Swordfish sword under X-rays: SAXS explained

Learn how scientists use bio-SAXS, an experimental X-ray technique, to study the shape and dynamics of proteins and other biomolecules. SAXS can be even used to analyse the structure of mineral particles in the swordfish sword bone, which can help scientists better understand bone ageing.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

31 August 2023 Part of a fruit fly embryo imaged against a dark background, with nuclei stained with DAPI (white), and a cluster of pole cells, marked by Vasa protein (yellow)

Spotlight: Off to the pole

For a fruit fly embryo to develop correctly, key factors need to get to the right place at the right time – a journey that starts in the developing egg, as seen in this image from the Ephrussi Group at EMBL Heidelberg

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

picture-of-the-weeksciencescience-technology

3 July 2023 In the foreground: an intrinsically disordered protein, which has a form of a tangled, unstructured string. In the background: a set of parallel curved lines.

Bringing research on disordered proteins to order

A third of all known proteins are either completely or partially unstructured. EMBL scientists contributed to a new set of guidelines – Minimum Information About a Disorder Experiment (MIADE) – that will help researchers share data on unstructured proteins in a more useful way and will enable…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

10 May 2023 Illustration showing a cute humanoid-shaped robot that spits pink droplets at a sheet.

Time-resolved crystallography for the masses

EMBL Hamburg scientists have contributed to the development of the Spitrobot, a ground-breaking experimental setup that will simplify creating molecular movies. The Spitrobot automates the sample preparation for time-resolved crystallography, which is used to create 3D snapshots of protein…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

4 April 2023 A mobile lab on a road, with the TREC logo on the side.

TREC is underway!

EMBL’s planetary biology flagship TREC expedition has officially started. The new project applies EMBL's expertise and technologies in molecular and cellular biology to current environmental challenges, and connects with a wide range of research disciplines.

EMBL ANNOUNCEMENTS

2023

embl-announcementseventsscience

22 March 2023 Artistic representation that features a long, winding helix joining together a doughnut-figure to a small shaggy ball to indicate the connections long-read sequencing can make about DNA mutations.

The ‘long read’ for cancer

Using Oxford Nanopore long-read sequencing, EMBL scientists sequenced a primary childhood brain tumour known as a medulloblastoma, uncovering a novel complex mutation pattern.

2023

science

2 February 2023 Science illustration showing from left to right the progression from cryo-EM software to an annotated image of sub-cellular organelles, using a deep learning software.

AI helps scientists decipher cellular structures

New artificial intelligence tool adds speed and detailed cellular information to analysis of cryo-electron tomography to aid researchers’ understanding of inner cell workings.

2023

science

9 January 2023

New molecular insights on medical cannabis

EMBL Grenoble researchers have investigated the interaction between THC and some proteins it might bind to. In a recent study, they showed in vitro that THC inhibits an important human enzyme called autotaxin.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2023

sciencescience-technology

1 December 2022

Getting closer to stopping toxoplasmosis infection

Recent studies supported by EMBL Grenoble’s expertise in structural biology research and scientific services have identified Altiratinib as a potential drug to stop toxoplasmosis infection and opened up treatment options against malaria.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

11 November 2022 Photos of four panel discussion speakers

Open science for climate justice

Our experts discuss the importance of open science for food security and preserving global biodiversity.

2022

perspectivesscience

2 November 2022 Fluorescent microscopy image of skeletal muscle with biological data imagery

AI4LIFE: AI models for bioimaging

Researchers across EMBL are helping to make artificial intelligence (AI) models for bioimaging analysis interoperable and openly available to the scientific community.

2022

announcementsscience

31 October 2022 Two photos of a cell nucleus with blue, bandage-like objects wrapped around a roundish nucleus. The photos show before and after a parasitic invasion, so few chromosomes remain afterwards.

Plankton zombies for Halloween!

Plankton parasites provide a zombie story perfect for Halloween. While invading single-celled plankton, these parasites devour the cell’s nucleus and hijack metabolism while the organism remains alive.

2022

science

10 October 2022 Retinal cells can be seen in a cross section. A blue stain (DAPI) marks the cell nuclei, barcoded background cells are visible in green, while a single dopaminergic cell is visible in the centre, marked in orange (Th) and pink (a second barcode).

Light-Seq: from images to sequences in context

Researchers have combined advanced light microscopy with next-generation sequencing to create a method to study cells directly in the context of their native tissues

2022

science

15 September 2022 The foreground shows two yellow pipes representing the human gastrointestinal tract coming together, representing the confluence of donor and recipient gut ecosystems. Bacteria can be seen as green shapes inside the pipes and various kinds of interactions between them are shown symbolically as a mixing of colours.

When microbiomes collide

EMBL researchers used data from over 300 human faecal microbiota transplants to gain an ecological understanding of what happens when two gut microbiomes clash.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

1 September 2022 4D reconstruction of a mouse limb with lateral and top view.

Building the ideal limb

EMBL researchers use a “fearless” computer reconstruction and a two-centuries-old mathematical approach to study limb bud growth.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

5 August 2022 A rod-like structure with green and magenta segments representing cellular markers.

Making patterns visible

How do gene expression patterns result in the generation of different cell types? Scientists at EMBL Heidelberg used the zebrafish notochord to find out.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

4 August 2022 An illustration provides representation of fingers hovering over a cell phone

Zooming in to get the full picture

EMBL and UW researchers plus additional collaborators have constructed a complete map of fruit fly embryonic development using machine learning. This research is foundational to better understanding overall embryo development in other species, including humans.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

18 July 2022 Large, elongated purple molecule has an on/off switch on it pointed to on.

The retron switch

EMBL researchers now understand the function of an elusive small DNA in bacteria and have developed a tool that can be used to better understand what might ‘switch on’ bacterial immune defences.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

10 June 2022 A colourful structural model of the doughnut-shaped human nuclear pore complex seen from above.

Puzzling out the structure of a molecular giant

Scientists have solved several mysteries around the structure and function of a true molecular giant: the human nuclear pore complex. They created the most complete model of the complex thanks to combining the program AlphaFold2 with cryo-electron tomography, integrative modelling, molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

6 May 2022 Drawing of two chromosomes in which a highlighted area is switched around.

Flip-flop genome

Researchers at EMBL Heidelberg found that inversions in the human genome are more common than previously thought, which impacts our understanding of certain genetic diseases.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

8 April 2022 a metaphor for the process of epigenetic inheritance

A metaphor for epigenetic inheritance

Recent studies from the Hackett group at EMBL Rome have revealed new insights on the mechanism regulating transmission of non-genetic information during embryonic development, and inspired a scientific illustration

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

4 March 2022 Science art expressing the concept of transcriptional neighbourhoods regulating transcript isoform lengths and expression levels.

Understanding genomes, piece by piece

Genomes are made up of thousands of individual pieces – genes – which are expressed at different levels. Researchers at EMBL have shed light on how the placement of a gene affects its expression, as well as that of its neighbours.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

4 March 2022 A gloved hand holds a slide with visible wells containing Matrigel immersed in culture medium. A magnified close-up shows a mouse embryo developing over the course of 48 hours

A 3D culture model to study embryo growth

A recent study by EMBL researchers proposes a new method to grow early embryos in the laboratory. With a 3D culture set-up, scientists can closely monitor the changes embryos undergo around the time of implantation.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

25 February 2022 Three colourful overlapping circles arranged in a row, a fruit-fly embryo being visible within each. Small circles within the embryos represent cell lineages.

Converging lenses on embryo development

Researchers from the Furlong group at EMBL have come up with a way to observe the development of fruit-fly embryos simultaneously at the genetic and cellular levels, generating a high-resolution and integrated view of how different cell lineages form.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

1 February 2022 A photograph of the Amazonian lancehead snake Bothrops atrox

Decoding the secrets of snake venom

EMBL Hamburg’s Grzegorz Chojnowski from the Wilmanns Group developed software called findMySequence, which identifies proteins’ amino-acid sequences based on electron cryo-microscopy and X-ray crystallography data. It’s useful for identifying unknown proteins in samples from natural sources.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

21 January 2022 The cross-section of a cell expressing a green fluorescently tagged protein and illuminated by a blue laser is visible in the foreground, surrounded by a vortex of cells

Cell sorting enters a new dimension

EMBL researchers, in collaboration with BD Biosciences, have demonstrated a new technology that allows rapid image-based sorting of cells. The new technology represents a major upgrade to flow cytometry and has applications in diverse life science fields.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2022

sciencescience-technology

21 December 2021 A model of the doughnut-shaped nuclear pore complex. Individual molecules are marked in various colours.

Observing the secret life of molecules inside the cell

EMBL Hamburg’s Kosinski Group, the Beck Laboratory at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics, and colleagues at EMBL Heidelberg recorded the nuclear pore complex contracting in living cells. They visualised the movement with an unprecedented level of detail with help of new software called…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

20 December 2021 A detailed structure map shows two proteins interacting in the foreground, each shown in a different colour. The background shows small green dots marking bacteria

Solving molecular puzzles to find the perfect fit

Using cryo-EM and structural biology techniques, EMBL researchers have shown how two proteins of Legionella pneumophila interact. This finding sheds light on a mechanism critical to the infection process and could lead to the development of new drugs to treat pneumonia.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

15 December 2021 An outline of Earth, covered with depictions of bacteria. The image of Earth is within a the frame of a computer window. There is an “Upload file” button on the bottom left, and a mouse cursor on the right.

Connecting the dots between bacterial genes around the world

Bork Group at EMBL Heidelberg analysed a new global gene database to study how genes emerge and spread across various habitats on our planet. In the future, the group will expand the database and use it for studying microbial gene evolution and dispersal at a finer-grained scale.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

8 December 2021 An illustration of the human gut, with coloured shapes representing bacteria. Three different drugs and drug combinations are shown affecting the bacteria, represented by changes in colour

The impact of drugs on gut microbes is greater than we thought

Researchers studying a massive cohort of European patients have found that commonly prescribed drugs for cardiometabolic disorders can have long-term effects on the gut microbiome. Such effects can complicate the understanding of how disease affects the microbiome and must be taken into…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

7 December 2021 A cartoon image showing a person's arm and a needle with a vaccine being injected into it. The text on the left reads: "EMBL research: How structural biologists at EMBL Hamburg help to develop and improve RNA vaccines"

How structural biology helps to make RNA vaccines

RNA vaccines, such as the ones for COVID-19, represent a new approach in vaccine technology. Cy Jeffries, faculty staff scientist at EMBL Hamburg, explains the clever technology behind RNA vaccines, and how structural biology contributes to its development. EMBL Hamburg collaborated on several…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

5 November 2021 Three-dimensional rendering of sponge neuroid cells (coloured orange) and sponge digestive cells (coloured green).

More than a gut reaction

What can sponges tell us about the evolution of the brain? Sponges have the genes involved in neuronal function in higher animals. But if sponges don’t have brains, what is the role of these? EMBL scientists imaged the sponge digestive chamber to find out.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

25 October 2021 A collage of the visuals representing each of the three modules of the eSPC platform.

Biophysics analysis made easy with an online tool

EMBL Hamburg’s Sample Preparation and Characterisation (SPC) Facility has released eSPC, an online platform for analysing data from biophysical experiments. The platform enables the scientific community to analyse data from different experiments without the need to travel.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

15 October 2021 In the middle, there are two molecules of pUL21. One is blurred, to represent the molecule’s flexibility. In the background are two neuronal scenes. The one on the left is healthy and has a smooth surface. The one on the right is infected, which is represented by several green viral particles.

How herpes seizes proteins’ means of production

The Graham and Crump groups at the University of Cambridge and the Svergun Group at EMBL Hamburg have discovered a mechanism by which the herpes simplex virus takes control of the molecular machinery of human cells. Their work reveals how a dedicated viral protein hijacks key host proteins, forcing…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

13 October 2021 Illustration of a community of bacteria. Pills represent an antibiotic that can be used to treat an infection, and a second drug that could protect many gut bacteria from antibiotics.

Tackling the collateral damage from antibiotics

Researchers from EMBL’s Typas group and collaborators have analysed the effects of 144 antibiotics on the wellbeing of gut microbes. The study improves our understanding of antibiotics’ side effects and suggests a new approach to mitigating the adverse effects of antibiotics therapy on gut…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

5 October 2021 Illustration of a globe with colourful shapes and symbols superimposed.

A cellular atlas of an entire worm

EMBL scientists and colleagues have developed an interactive atlas of the entire marine worm Platynereis dumerilii in its larval stage. The PlatyBrowser resource combines high-resolution gene expression data with volume electron microscopy images.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

23 September 2021 Pink and blue dominate a blurry image against a black background that is actually a global image of a 30-day-old Octopus vulgaris

The secret life of baby octopuses

Some of the most amazing creatures live in the deep blue sea. The Mesoscopic Imaging Facility (MIF) at EMBL Barcelona was recently involved in studying one unique feature of the octopus: the ephemeral structures on the surface of their skin called Kölliker’s organs.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

8 September 2021 Illustration of two halves of a pill, which releases chemical molecules that are taken up by gut bacteria in the vicinity.

Common medications accumulate in gut bacteria

A new collaborative study led by EMBL group leaders Kiran Patil, Nassos Typas, and Peer Bork has found that common medications accumulate in human gut bacteria. This process reduces drug effectiveness and affects the metabolism of common gut microbes, thereby altering the gut microbiome.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

7 September 2021 Close up of the interior of a light-sheet microscope, featuring optical equipment and a transparent cube.

A flip book for biological systems

In the Mesoscopic Imaging Facility (MIF) at EMBL Barcelona, researchers study the details of biological systems in the context of organs, body parts, or entire organisms. This image shows OPTiSPIM1, one of the custom light-sheet microscope setups available at the facility.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

29 June 2021

Planetary egg cells

As evocative as a constellation of planets, these egg cells within a mouse ovary are at different stages of maturity.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

picture-of-the-weeksciencescience-technology

3 June 2021 Illustration of a rocky coastline with sailing boat, mountains, underwater organisms, bridge and factory in the background.

Living laboratories

Under the innovative Planetary Biology research theme, EMBL scientists aim to understand life in the context of its environment.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

21 May 2021 Image of a mosquito on a clear surface

EMBL scientists support malaria research

EMBL scientists support research on malaria by providing freely available data resources and using innovative experimental approaches. Our Course and Conference Office facilitates the exchange of knowledge in the field by hosting the annual BioMalPar conference.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

4 March 2021

Induced pluripotent stem cells reveal causes of disease

Scientists in the Stegle group and colleagues have studied induced pluripotent stem cells from around 1,000 donors to identify correlations between individual genetic variants and altered gene expression. They linked more than 4,000 of the genetic variants responsible for altered expression…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

16 February 2021 Microscopy images of coronavirus-infected cells in blue and red, arranged on a clockface. Illustrations of virus particles.

Finding coronavirus’s helper proteins

A team of EMBL scientists and colleagues have analysed how the novel coronavirus affects proteins in human cells. They identified several human proteins as potential drug targets to prevent viral replication.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

20 January 2021

The SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7 lineage

A note on the coronavirus variant B.1.1.7, which has first been described in the U.K. and has spread to 57 countries. The note summarises epidemiological information about the spread of B.1.1.7 in the U.K. collated and in part conducted by researchers from EMBL-EBI.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

14 January 2021 An electron microscopy photo shows two bacterial cells surrounded by several white fibrils of the amphibian peptide.

Toadlet peptide transforms into a deadly weapon against bacteria

Researchers at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology and EMBL Hamburg, in collaboration with scientists in Israel and Spain, have discovered remarkable molecular properties of an antimicrobial peptide from the skin of the Australian toadlet. The discovery could inspire the development of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2021

sciencescience-technology

18 December 2020

Stronger together

Gene activation requires the cooperative activity of multiple transcription factors. Until now, the mechanism used by these factors to coordinate their actions has been poorly understood. EMBL’s Krebs group presents a DNA footprinting method that makes it possible to determine whether…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

7 December 2020 Female scientist stands in front of electron microscope that is taller than she is

Seeing deeper inside cells

While cryo-electron tomography (cryo-ET) was first envisioned in 1968, the advances the Mahamid group are bringing to this 3D method for studying molecules directly inside cells are new, and are likely to greatly expand its use.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

2 December 2020 The image is a green coloured cell, with a wild and textured surface which is composed of many different shapes and shadows.

Scratching the surface on cell differentiation

Scientists in the Diz-Muñoz group at EMBL Heidelberg are working to build understanding of the role that mechanical properties play in affecting cell behaviour – a young and rapidly developing field of study. They have developed and successfully used a highly specialised technique to manipulate…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

23 November 2020 Tube-like structures of a cell at sub-cellular level in red and grey.

Replication cycle of SARS-CoV-2 in 3D

Researchers have studied SARS-CoV-2 replication in cells and obtained detailed insights into the alterations induced in infected cells. This information is essential to guide the development of urgently needed therapeutic strategies for suppressing viral replication and induced pathology.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

4 November 2020 SARS-CoV-2 is represented as a sphere with spike proteins poking out of its surface, which give it a corona-like appearance. The spike proteins resemble triangular ‘bushes’ with three tips at the top. In the background, a cell surface is visible with ACE2 proteins poking out of it in many places. The virus is about to attach to the cell surface. The sybodies, represented as tiny V-shaped structures, bind to the viral spike proteins at their tips.

Scientists identify synthetic mini-antibody to combat COVID-19

By screening hundreds of sybodies (synthetic mini-antibodies), scientists have identified one that might stop SARS-CoV-2 from infecting human cells. This work, which holds promise for treating COVID-19, was conducted by EMBL Hamburg and collaborators from the Centre for Structural Systems Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

15 October 2020 Four blue circular objects are surrounded with green structures, and the central blue circle with pink structures. The blue circles are human cell nuclei, and pink and green structures are proteins.

Repurposing drugs for a pan-coronavirus treatment

Scientists from the Beltrao Group at EMBL-EBI and collaborators identified drug targets common to SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV-1, and MERS-CoV, three pathogenic coronaviruses. They also found potential drugs that could be repurposed as COVID-19 treatments, and against emerging coronavirus strains in the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

18 September 2020 Composite image of mouse cells and human cells showing different levels of luminescence, indicated as different colours.

Human and mouse cells run at different speeds

The internal clock that governs the development of embryos ticks slower for humans than for mice. Differences in the speed of biochemical reactions underlie the differences between species in the tempo of development.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

3 September 2020 Left: Slice of a cell in grey. Right: Two 3D reconstructions of parts of the slice, showing the internal structure.

Nuclear pores in their natural context

Scientists from the Beck group have studied the 3D structure of nuclear pores in budding yeast. They show how the architecture of the nuclear pore complex differs inside cells compared to its form observed in vitro studies.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

31 August 2020 3D image of plant cells. The ones identified by the algorithm are brightly coloured.

Intelligent software tackles plant cell jigsaw

Starting with computer code and moving on to a more user-friendly graphical interface called PlantSeg, the Kreshuk Group at EMBL and collaborators built a simple open-access method to provide the most accurate and versatile analysis of plant tissue development to date.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

3 August 2020 A woman with glasses holds a book. The book cover says "Gene naming rules". Thought bubbles float around her head and display gene symbols like BRCA1.

Bagpipe and Pokemon, or how not to name a human gene

The human genome harbours about 19 000 protein-coding genes, many of which still have no known function. As scientists unveil the secrets of our DNA, they come across novel genes that they need to refer to using a unique name. The Human Genome Organisation’s Gene Nomenclature Committee (HGNC) at…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

20 July 2020 A magnifying glass hovers over the human gut, revealing its biodiversity.

Unparalleled inventory of the human gut ecosystem

An international team of scientists has collated all known bacterial genomes from the human gut microbiome into a single large database. Their work will allow researchers to explore the links between bacterial genes and proteins, and their effects on human health.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

3 July 2020 stem cells neurons differentiation

From stem cells to neurons

Scientists at EMBL Heidelberg have investigated stem cells and how they differentiate to become neurons. Their approach included an assessment of the complex interplay of molecules during the differentiation process and generated fundamental new insights into the role of a protein called Sox2 in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

2 July 2020 epigenetic reprogramming, epigenetic memory, Hackett group

Unravelling epigenetic reprogramming

A study conducted by the Hackett group at EMBL Rome has identified key factors controlling the complex system of gene regulation during early embryo development, shedding new light on the mechanisms behind these events and on their evolutionary implications. Their findings are published in Nature…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

29 June 2020 Gene Editing and Embryology Facility at EMBL Rome

Editing the mouse genome to study SARS-CoV-2 infection

To study how SARS-CoV-2 infects cells, the Gene Editing and Embryology Facility (GEEF) at EMBL Rome will generate mice that express a human version of a protein called ACE2. The mouse line will be shared with preclinical research collaborators carrying out vaccine and antibody trials, and with the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

25 June 2020 Scientists in the Hackett group at EMBL Rome doing lab work

Silencing the SARS-CoV-2 receptor with epigenetic modifications

EMBL scientists develop a new molecular tool to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection in mice. This tool is able to cause targeted epigenetic modifications of specific genes in specific cell populations. They will use it in mice to target airway cells that express the ACE2 protein – the receptor that…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

16 June 2020 Tissue culture plates in an incubator.

Understanding how SARS-CoV-2 behaves in the gut

Scientists at EMBL and Heidelberg University Hospital are studying how the novel coronavirus behaves in the gut to try to better understand its epidemiology and prevent its spread. To do this, they are combining advanced imaging and sequencing technologies to study coronavirus in human intestinal…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

9 June 2020 This image shows the structure of a bacterial group II intron

Genetic cut and paste at atomic resolution

Researchers in the Marcia group at EMBL Grenoble and the De Vivo lab at the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa have obtained some of the most detailed ever snapshots of the splicing process in systems known as group II self-splicing introns. The new insights will help scientists to develop…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

9 June 2020 Beamline Hamburg

Shining high-brilliance beams on coronavirus structure

EMBL researchers are studying COVID-19-related molecules by exposing them to high-brilliance X-ray beams. The Svergun group at EMBL Hamburg is using biological small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) as part of a global effort by scientists to elucidate the structural organisation of SARS-CoV-2…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

8 June 2020 Microscopic image showing a macrophage that has been infected with Salmonella (green), causing cellular cathepsins (red) to locate to the nucels (blue).

Re-trafficking proteins to fight Salmonella infections

Scientists including members of EMBL’s Typas group have investigated how immune cells called macrophages respond to infection by the intracellular pathogen Salmonella enterica. They discovered that Salmonella causes newly produced cathepsins to accumulate in the nuclei of infected cells to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

1 June 2020 An illustration of single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq)

Enabling functional genomics studies in individual cells

Scientists at EMBL Heidelberg have developed a new method, called Targeted Perturb-seq (TAP-seq), which increases the scale and precision of functional genomics CRISPR–Cas9 screens by orders of magnitude. Their method overcomes limitations in previous applications of single-cell RNA sequencing,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

27 May 2020 Automated sample changer and diffractometer at the ID30B X-ray crystallography beamline at ESRF Grenoble.

Facilitating COVID-19 structural biology research

EMBL and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) restart the activities of the Joint Structural Biology Group in Grenoble to support coronavirus-related projects. A new initiative will allow users to be granted access to the High-Throughput Crystallisation (HTX) lab at EMBL and to a…

CONNECTIONS

2020

connectionsscience

22 May 2020

The hunt for neutralising antibodies against SARS-CoV-2

Scientists hope that a legacy of the novel coronavirus in recovered COVID-19 patients – antibodies in their blood – could lead to drugs to treat others. The Merten group at EMBL Heidelberg has pivoted its microfluidics platform to support the search for neutralising antibodies that could…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

22 May 2020

EMBL scientists investigate rare lung disease

Researchers in EMBL’s Zaugg group have studied the causes of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), a rare disease that causes high blood pressure in the arteries of the lungs. The study, carried out in collaboration with Stanford University School of Medicine, compared lung cells of patients…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

15 May 2020 Cell division

Tracing the origins of cells

Researchers from the Sharpe group at EMBL Barcelona have published a method to track the developmental history of a cell using the gene editing tool CRISPR–Cas9, but without the need to create transgenic organisms.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

13 May 2020 Close-up photograph of servers at EMBL Heidelberg's data centre.

Understanding the role of our genes in SARS-CoV-2 infections

EMBL scientists will contribute to the new German COVID-19 OMICS Initiative to study the biological mechanisms contributing to coronavirus infections. EMBL group leaders Jan Korbel and Oliver Stegle, who is also affiliated with the DKFZ Heidelberg, will coordinate the set-up of IT infrastructures…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

11 May 2020

EMBL SPC facility supports COVID-19 projects

The Sample Preparation and Characterisation Facility (SPC) at EMBL Hamburg reopens to support scientists working on Covid-19 research. The SPC Facility is one of the best equipped facilities in Europe is therefore in high demand from external users. Re-opening the facility also allows experts at…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

29 April 2020 The Influenza virus

Understanding the influenza virus

The infectious disease commonly known as flu is caused by the influenza virus. It spreads around the world in seasonal outbreaks, causing millions of infections and hundreds of thousands of deaths each year. Stephen Cusack, Head of EMBL Grenoble, has been studying different aspects of the influenza…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

28 April 2020 Close-up view of the interior of a protein analytics system

Exploring synthetic antibodies to stop coronavirus

Scientists at EMBL Hamburg and Karolinska Institutet Stockholm aim to find synthetic antibodies – known as nanobodies – that bind a surface protein of the novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. Nanobodies could prevent the virus from entering human cells and causing COVID-19.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

24 April 2020 Collage of images representing wet and dry lab research and healthcare

Why share data during a pandemic?

In March 2020, planes were grounded, streets went quiet, and our lives changed forever. But while the world came to a halt, many scientists were ramping up their efforts to understand the new virus.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

16 April 2020 Micropipette tips in a liquid-handling robot

Helping to scale up coronavirus testing

Scientists at EMBL Heidelberg are contributing their expertise in a community effort to develop large-scale testing methods for coronavirus. Their goal is to increase the capacity and speed of testing, which is crucial for containing the pandemic.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

1 April 2020

Understanding brain tumours in children

The causes of 40 percent of all cases of certain medulloblastoma – dangerous brain tumours affecting children – are hereditary. These are the findings of a recent genetic analysis carried out by scientists from EMBL and numerous colleagues around the world.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

11 March 2020 Leukaemia stem cells are located in a patient’s bone marrow (shown here in blue) in the so-called stem cell niche. The green structure is the bone itself. Credit: Dr. Raphael Lutz, Haas Lab

€2.45 m to investigate leukaemia causes and therapies

The Heidelberg-based LeukoSyStem consortium investigates leukaemia stem cells in acute myeloid leukaemia. The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research financially supports this collaboration between Heidelberg University Hospital, HI-STEM gGmbH, the German Cancer Research Center and EMBL.

EMBL ANNOUNCEMENTS

2020

embl-announcementsscience

5 February 2020

Protecting data in the cloud

Cloud computing offers unprecedented opportunities for global-scale research collaborations. It also presents a unique set of challenges in terms of data protection and the ethics of data sharing.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

5 February 2020

Cancer mutations occur decades before diagnosis

Researchers at EMBL’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) and the Francis Crick Institute have analysed the whole genomes of over 2600 tumours from 38 different cancer types to determine the chronology of genomic changes during cancer development.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

5 February 2020

Analysis of human genomes in the cloud

Scientists from EMBL present a tool for large-scale analysis of genomic data with cloud computing. Main advantages of the new tool, called Butler, are continuous system monitoring and its ability to self-heal in case of failure, allowing for 43% more efficient data processing than previous…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

5 February 2020

Chromothripsis in human cancer

Researchers at Harvard Medical School and EMBL-EBI have carried out the largest analysis across cancer types of the newly discovered mutational phenomenon chromothripsis.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2020

sciencescience-technology

15 July 2019 The pyramids represent chromatin domains in the wild-type situation. The reflection in the water below represents the rearrangements in the mutant fruit fly chromosomes. At first glance the (regulatory) landscapes look very similar, but there are lots of changes to the topology, and yet these have little impact on the nature of the landscape (gene expression). IMAGE: Beata Edyta Mierzwa in collaboration with EMBL.

Rearranging chromosomes

Does rearranging chromosomes affect their function? EMBL scientists reveal uncoupling of 3D chromatin organisation and gene expression.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2019

sciencescience-technology

21 September 2017

Fish on fire

New study by Paola Kuri and Maria Leptin shows how inflammation happens in zebrafish in real time

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2017

sciencescience-technology

7 December 2016

Cycle of life

Paul Nurse’s failed experiment inspired a career that would uncover key mechanisms of cell division

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2016

sciencescience-technology

30 August 2016

Atomic proportions

EMBL and ESRF scientists and mechanics work together on upgrade for one of Europe’s big X-ray sources

CONNECTIONS

2016

connectionsscience

12 February 2016 Cells formed circles where blinking happened in a wave, rolling outwards from the centre. IMAGE: EMBL/C.Tsiairis

In sync

What do cells in an embryo have in common with schools of fish, swarms of fireflies, and applauding audiences?

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2016

sciencescience-technology

17 December 2015 Digital zebrafish embryo provided the first complete developmental blueprint of a vertebrate in 2008. IMAGE: EMBL/Keller et al.

SPIM doctors

From initial development to a start-up company: Selective Plane Illumination Microscopy (SPIM) at EMBL.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

30 October 2015

One hard pull

Fibres that pull membrane to form a vesicle exert a force that’s 2500 times a yeast cell’s own weight

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

2 October 2015 The 1000 Genomes Project: a timeline

A lasting legacy

1000 Genomes Project pushed technologies and knowledge forward to understand what is 'normal' human genetic variation

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

17 September 2015 The scientists combined data from a variety of techniques to better understand how rats – and humans – age. IMAGE: Brandon Toyama/Salk Institute

Ages apart

Multifaceted approach reveals how brain and liver age, helps explain why ageing brain loses plasticity.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

25 February 2015 The team used computer simulations to investigate the mitotic spindle's strength. IMAGE: EMBL/F. NÉDÉLEC

Under pressure

How strong does a spindle need to be? Videos put cell’s chromosome-separating machinery to the test

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

27 January 2015 Building blocks TAF8 (blue), TAF10 (green) and TAF2 (not shown) form a module in the cytoplasm before entering the nucleus to form TFIID. IMAGE: EMBL/I.BERGER

Come together

First experimental proof that a key cellular machine forms by uniting pre-assembled modules.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2015

sciencescience-technology

25 June 2014

Chain reactions

Scientists determine the structure of auxin response factors: daisy-chains that regulate gene expression

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2014

sciencescience-technology

2 February 2014

Making your brain social

In many people with autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders, different parts of the brain don’t talk to each other very well. Scientists have now identified, for the first time, a way in which this decreased functional connectivity can come about. In a study published online today…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2014

sciencescience-technology

10 November 2013

What are you scared of?

What do bullies and sex have in common? Based on work by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Monterotondo, Italy, it seems that the same part of the brain reacts to both. In a study published today in Nature Neuroscience, the researchers found that – at least in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

23 October 2013

Bigger, better, faster

The molecular machine that makes essential components of ribosomes – the cell’s protein factories – is like a Swiss-army knife, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas in Madrid, Spain, have found.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

13 October 2013

Choreographed origami

An important step in building ribosomes – the cell’s protein factories – is like a strictly choreographed dance, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have discovered. To build these factories, other ‘machines’ inside the cell have to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

25 September 2013

Without a trace

Migrating cells, it seems, cover their tracks not for fear of being followed, but to keep moving forward. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have now shown that cells in a zebrafish embryo determine which direction they move in by effectively…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

12 September 2013

Potential new drug target for cystic fibrosis

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg and Regensburg University, both in Germany, and the University of Lisboa, in Portugal, have discovered a promising potential drug target for cystic fibrosis. Their work, published online today in Cell, also uncovers a…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

11 August 2013

From fireman to arsonist

Like a fireman who becomes an arsonist, a protein that prevents cells becoming cancerous can also cause tumours, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Grenoble, France, have discovered. The finding, published today in Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, stems…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

11 August 2013

PS: It’s not cholesterol

How our body processes cholesterol has a well-known impact on our health, but it turns out that another ‘fat molecule’ – or lipid – may be at the heart of some diseases which were thought to involve cholesterol. A group of proteins linked to conditions such as metabolic syndrome and some…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

7 August 2013

Cells eat themselves into shape

The process cells use to ‘swallow’ up nutrients, hormones and other signals from their environment – called endocytosis – can play a crucial role in shaping the cells themselves, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have found. The study,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

11 July 2013

How to build your gate

It’s a parent’s nightmare: opening a Lego set and being faced with 500 pieces, but no instructions on how to assemble them into the majestic castle shown on the box. Thanks to a new approach by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

14 May 2013

But what does it do?

Although we know the tool’s general purpose, it can sometimes be difficult to tell if a specific pair of precision tweezers belongs to a surgeon or a master jeweller. It is now easier to solve similar conundrums about a type of protein that allows cells to react to their environment, thanks to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

24 April 2013

Pushing the boundaries of transcription

Like musicians in an orchestra who have the same musical score but start and finish playing at different intervals, cells with the same genes start and finish transcribing them at different points in the genome. For the first time, researchers at EMBL have described the striking diversity of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

11 March 2013

Havoc in biology’s most-used human cell line

HeLa cells are the world’s most commonly used human cell lines, and have served as a standard for understanding many fundamental biological processes. In a study published today in G3: Genes, Genomes and Genetics online, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

28 February 2013

DNA’s twisted communication

During embryo development, genes are dynamically, and very precisely, switched on and off to confer different properties to different cells and build a well-proportioned and healthy animal. Fgf8 is one of the key genes in this process, controlling in particular the growth of the limbs and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

28 February 2013

Zeroing in on heart disease

Studies screening the genome of hundreds of thousands of individuals (known as Genome-wide association studies or GWAS) have linked more than 100 regions in the genome to the risk of developing cardiovascular disease. Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

11 February 2013

One disease, two mechanisms

While prostate cancer is the most common cancer in elderly Western men it also, but more rarely, strikes patients aged between 35 and 50. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, in collaboration with several other research teams in Germany*, have…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

4 February 2013

Learning from the linker

Mature cells can be reprogrammed to pluripotency and thus regain the ability to divide and differentiate into specialized cell types. Although these so-called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) represent a milestone in stem cell research, many of the biochemical processes that underlie…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

31 January 2013

The mutation police

Scientists at the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) and the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in the UK have discovered how our genome keeps the effects of mutations in check. The discovery, published in the journal Cell, will help in the study of diseases such as cancer and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

23 January 2013

EMBL-EBI researchers make DNA storage a reality

Researchers at the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) have created a way to store data in the form of DNA – a material that lasts for tens of thousands of years. The new method, published today in the journal Nature, makes it possible to store at least 100 million hours of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

17 January 2013

The cell that isn’t

This may look like yet another video of a dividing cell, but there’s a catch. You are looking at chromosomes (red) being pulled apart by the mitotic spindle (green), but it’s not a cell, because there’s no cell membrane. Like a child sucking an egg out of its shell, Ivo Telley from the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

6 January 2013

Protein production: going viral

A research team of scientists from EMBL Grenoble and the IGBMC in Strasbourg, France, have, for the first time, described in molecular detail the architecture of the central scaffold of TFIID: the human protein complex essential for transcription from DNA to mRNA. The study, published today…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2013

sciencescience-technology

19 December 2012

Sync to grow

Gene expression wave in the lower part of the future vertebrae column of a mammalian embryo. As the wave goes forward, new pre-vertebrae are formed and the future vertebrae column elongates. (Image and video credit: Nature) In a nutshell: The size of pre-vertebrae in a mammalian embryo is…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

5 December 2012

My microbes

In a nutshell : The gut metagenome is the collection of all the genomes of all the microbes  in the human intestinal tract : it is specific to each human, like a second genetic signature At least in healthy humans, this personal metagenome is stable over time The gut metagenome is…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

31 October 2012

Spot the difference

In a nutshell: 1st map combining human genetic variation at different scales – from single letters to large chunks Based on genomes of 1092 healthy people from Europe, the Americas and East Asia Could help identify genetic causes of disease, rather than just links Data made freely available in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

27 September 2012 Diagram showing looping DNA

Loop the loop, DNA style

In a nutshell: Looping and unlooping DNA adjusts readout from gene and spread of regulation throughout the genome When a gene forms a loop, its output increases, as the transcription machinery that reads it is trapped into moving only along that gene When the gene loop is undone, transcription…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

23 September 2012 Cartoon showing cell communication

Cellular eavesdropping made easy

In a nutshell: New method allows precise analysis of proteins released by cells over time (distinguishes them from proteins in the cells’ culture serum) Advantages: cells don’t have to be starved: avoids bias and allows more cell types to be studied; can follow fast reactions like immune…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

5 September 2012 ENCODE researchers found that most of our DNA has a function: controlling when and where genes are turned on and off.

Fast forward for biomedical research

Today, an international team of researchers reveal that much of what has been called ‘junk DNA’ in the human genome is actually a massive control panel with millions of switches regulating the activity of our genes. Without these switches, genes would not work – and mutations in these regions…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

3 August 2012

How the cell swallows

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have combined the power of two kinds of microscope to produce a 3-dimensional movie of how cells ‘swallow’ nutrients and other molecules by engulfing them. The study, published today in Cell, is the…

2012

sciencetechnology-and-innovation

2 August 2012 Different inhibitors (yellow, grey) fill the cave-like active site of the cap-snatching protein (the endonuclease, in green) differently, even though they all bind to the active site’s two metal ions (magenta).

Catching the cap-snatcher

Researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Grenoble, France, have determined the detailed 3-dimensional structure of part of the flu virus’ RNA polymerase, an enzyme that is crucial for influenza virus replication. This important finding is published today in PLoS…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

19 July 2012 The female (left) fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is larger than the male (right). Image credit: EMBL.

Of flies and men

What do you get when you dissect 10 000 fruit-fly larvae? A team of researchers led by the EMBL- European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) in the UK and the Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics (MPI) in Germany has discovered a way in which cells can adjust the activity of many…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

12 July 2012

Italy pledges to be part of ELIXIR research infrastructure

Italy has pledged to participate in ELIXIR, a major undertaking to safeguard the results of life science research in Europe. With one of Europe’s larger economies now demonstrating its commitment to ELIXIR, this burgeoning research infrastructure is well placed to continue its excellent progress.…

CONNECTIONS

2012

connectionsscience

5 July 2012

Stop and go

A traffic policeman standing at a busy intersection directing the flow of vehicles may be a rare sight these days, but a similar scene appears to still frequently play out in our cells. A protein called Lem4 directs a crucial step of cell division by preventing the progress of one molecule while…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

21 June 2012

Flu fighters

Savira pharmaceuticals GmbH, a spin-off of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) based in Vienna, Austria, has signed a collaboration and license agreement with Roche, thus further strengthening the links between fundamental research and major pharmaceutical development companies. This…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

3 June 2012

Shape-shifting shell

As a retrovirus matures, the two parts of its shell protein (red and blue or yellow and blue) dramatically rearrange themselves, twisting and moving away from each other. (Credit: EMBL/T.Bharat) Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have for the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

3 June 2012

Video Release: Filming life in the fast lane

“This video shows a fruit fly embryo from when it was about two-and-a-half hours old until it walked away from the microscope as a larva, 20 hours later,” says Lars Hufnagel, from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany. “It shows all the hallmarks of fruit fly…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

3 June 2012 Silenced genes in a cell

Export extravaganza

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have conducted the first comprehensive census of human cells’ export workers. In a study published online today in Nature Cell Biology, they found an unexpected variety of genes involved in transporting…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

31 May 2012 Word cloud of proteins

The cell’s ‘New World’

In one of the most famous faux pas of exploration, Columbus set sail for India and instead ‘discovered’ America. Similarly, when scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, set out to find enzymes – the proteins that carry out chemical…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

24 May 2012 Microglial cells

Locating ground zero

Like emergency workers rushing to a disaster scene, cells called microglia speed to places where the brain has been injured, to contain the damage by ‘eating up’ any cellular debris and dead or dying neurons. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

22 April 2012 Abstract image showing DNA code

A matter of priorities

Just as banks store away only the most valuable possessions in the most secure safes, cells prioritise which genes they guard most closely, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) have found. The study, published online today…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

18 March 2012

Need for speed

Like any law-abiding train passenger, a molecule called oskar RNA carries a stamped ticket detailing its destination and form of transport, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have found. They show that for this molecule, moving in the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

1 March 2012

Flying high in Europe

Today a consortium of leading IT providers and three of Europe’s biggest research centres (CERN, EMBL and ESA) announced a partnership to launch a European cloud computing platform. ‘Helix Nebula ‐ the Science Cloud’, will support the massive IT requirements of European…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

28 February 2012

Making the most of what you have

The bacterium Mycoplasma pneumoniae, which causes atypical pneumonia, is helping scientists uncover how cells make the most of limited resources. By measuring all the proteins this bacterium produces, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

23 February 2012

New distributed research infrastructure for structural biology

Breakthroughs in biomedical science are a step closer today, with the launch of a new distributed research infrastructure for the science of structural biology: Instruct. The launch of Instruct will give academic and commercial scientists across Europe access to a full portfolio of integrated…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

19 February 2012 Diagram of the Elongator protein

Trapped in a ring

In fairy tales, magic rings endow their owners with special abilities: the ring makes the wearer invisible, fulfils his wishes, or otherwise helps the hero on the path to his destiny.  Similarly, a ring-like structure found in a protein complex called ‘Elongator’ has led researchers at the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

14 February 2012

Stretching helices help keep muscles together

Myomesin stretching to 2.5 times its length. Credit: EMBL/Wilmanns. In this video, a protein called myomesin does its impression of Mr. Fantastic, the leader of the Fantastic Four of comic book fame, who performed incredible feats by stretching his body. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

2 February 2012 Fruit fly embryo showing the cells that will become the gut and heart

Collective action

If you wanted to draw your family tree, you could start by searching for people who share your surname. Cells, of course, don’t have surnames, but scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have found that genetic switches called enhancers, and the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

19 January 2012 Artist's impression of a chromosome exploding

Rigged to explode?

An inherited mutation in a gene known as the guardian of the genome is likely the link between exploding chromosomes and some particularly aggressive types of cancer, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), the German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ) and the University…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

12 January 2012

Evolution by ‘copy-paste’

A team of geneticists and computational biologists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and Cancer Research UK reveal how an ancient mechanism is involved in gene control and continues to drive genome…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

8 January 2012 Diagram of chromatin enhancers

Tracking genes’ remote controls

As an embryo develops, different genes are turned on in different cells, to form muscles, neurons and other bodily parts. Inside each cell’s nucleus, genetic sequences known as enhancers act like remote controls, switching genes on and off. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2012

sciencescience-technology

13 October 2011 In the absence of viral RNA (top), the part of RIG-I that senses viral RNA is exposed (orange), whilst the domains responsible for signalling (blue and pink) are out of reach of the signalling machinery. When RIG-I detects viral RNA, it changes shape (bottom), and the signalling domains become accessible to sound the alarm.

Intruder detected: raise the alarm!

When a thief breaks into a bank vault, sensors are activated and the alarm is raised. Cells have their own early-warning system for intruders, and scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Grenoble, France, have discovered how a particular protein sounds that alarm when it…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

18 August 2011 Circling chromosomes. Chromosomes (blue) form a ‘belt’ around the centre of the spindle (green), discovered by the EMBL scientists.

Fishing games gone wrong

When an egg cell is being formed, the cellular machinery which separates chromosomes is extremely imprecise at fishing them out of the cell’s interior, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have discovered. The unexpected degree of trial-and-error…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

7 August 2011 The new microscope that developed by scientists at EMBL, which can follow single molecules by the millisecond Credit: EMBL/H.Neves.

Live from the scene: biochemistry in action

Researchers can now watch molecules move in living cells, literally millisecond by millisecond, thanks to a new microscope developed by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany. Published online today in Nature Biotechnology, the new technique provides…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

21 July 2011 Microglia (green) in a mouse brain. The nuclei of all cells in the brain are labelled blue. Credit: EMBL/ R.Paolicelli

Gardening in the brain

Gardeners know that some trees require regular pruning: some of their branches have to be cut so that others can grow stronger. The same is true of the developing brain: cells called microglia prune the connections between neurons, shaping how the brain is wired, scientists at the European…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

21 July 2011 Model of the inner ring (green) of the nuclear pore, showing its components.

A hot species for cool structures

A fungus that lives at extremely high temperatures could help understand structures within our own cells. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and Heidelberg University, both in Heidelberg, Germany, were the first to sequence and analyse the genome of a heat-loving fungus,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

17 June 2011 Condensin loops around several strands of DNA, keeping it coiled up and easier to transport. (Artistic impression) Image credits: EMBL/ P. Riedinger

Keeping it together

As any rock-climber knows, trailing a long length of rope behind you is not easy. A dangling length of rope is unwieldy and hard to manoeuvre, and can get tangled up or stuck on an outcropping. Cells face the same problem when dragging chromosomes apart during cell division. The chromosomes are…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

20 April 2011 Artistic impression of the 3 human gut types.

What’s your gut type?

In the future, when you walk into a doctor’s surgery or hospital, you could be asked not just about your allergies and blood group, but also about your gut type. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and collaborators in the international MetaHIT…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

20 March 2011

The informant: a jumping gene

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have developed a new method for studying gene regulation, by employing a jumping gene as an informant. Published online today in Nature Genetics, the new method is called GROMIT. It enables researchers to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

11 March 2011

Small code change, big effect

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have developed a new method which enables researchers to label any protein of their choice with any of a wide variety of previously available compounds, in living cells, by introducing a single reactive…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

6 March 2011 By silencing genes two at a time in cells like these, the scientists can analyse the genes’ combined effects. In this microscopy image of human cells, nuclei are shown in red, cell membranes in green, and the cellular scaffolding in blue.

Suggesting genes’ friends, facebook-style

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ), both in Heidelberg, Germany, have developed a new method that uncovers the combined effects of genes. Published online today in Nature Methods, it helps understand how different genes can…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

sciencescience-technology

14 February 2011 3D structure of Mycobacterium tuberculosis’ enzyme PriA

Two in one

In a paper published online today in PNAS, scientists from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Hamburg, Germany, reveal new insights into the workings of enzymes from a group of bacteria including Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacterium that causes tuberculosis. The new findings…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

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3 February 2011

Blood-clotting protein linked to cancer and septicaemia

In our not-so-distant evolutionary past, stress often meant imminent danger, and the risk of blood loss, so part of our body’s stress response is to stock-pile blood-clotting factors. Scientists in the Molecular Medicine Partnership Unit (MMPU), a collaboration between the European Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

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2 February 2011

The human genome’s breaking points

A detailed analysis of data from 185 human genomes sequenced in the course of the 1000 Genomes Project, by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, in collaboration with researchers at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Cambridge, UK, as well as the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

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23 January 2011 Micropilot detected cells at particular stages of cell division

Intelligent microscopy

The sight of a researcher sitting at a microscope for hours, painstakingly searching for the right cells, may soon be a thing of the past, thanks to new software created by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany. Presented today in Nature Methods, the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2011

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12 December 2010 This cryo-electron microscopy image shows the 3D structure of the ribosome (yellow/blue) bound to the signal recognition particle (SRP) and the SRP receptor (both in red). Below it is an atomic model of SRP (green-yellow/orange) and its receptor (pink). Image credits: EMBL/Schaffitzel.

How cells export and embed proteins in the membrane

Like an overprotective parent on the first day of school, a targeting factor sometimes needs a little push to let go of its cargo. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Grenoble, France, have visualised one such hand-over. They were the first to determine the structure…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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2 December 2010 Euro-BioImaging will provide open access to state-of-the-art biological imaging techniques like fluorescence microscopy, which produced this snapshot of chromosomes (blue) being pulled apart in a dividing egg. Image credits: EMBL/ T. Kitajima

Better imaging from bench to bedside

From microscopy to computer tomography (CT) scans, imaging plays an important role in biological and biomedical research, but obtaining high-quality images often requires advanced technology and expertise, and can be costly. Euro-BioImaging, a project which launches its preparatory phase today,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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16 November 2010

One-touch make-up – for our cells

The cells in the different parts of this video are always the same (grey), but, like actors using make-up to highlight different facial features, they have fluorescent labels that mark different cellular components in different colours: blue shows the nucleus, yellow shows tubulin (a component of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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27 October 2010

1000 Genomes Project ushers in new era for human genetics

The 1000 Genomes Project, a major international collaboration to build a detailed map of human genetic variation, has completed its pilot phase. The results are now published in the journal Nature and freely available through the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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2 September 2010 A virtual Platynereis brain (left), created by averaging microscopy images of the brains of 36 different individuals, onto which scientists mapped gene activity (right). Perspective shows the brain as viewed from inside a Platynereis larvae, at 48 hours' old. Image credits: EMBL/R. Tomer

Brainy worms: Evolution of the cerebral cortex

Our cerebral cortex, or pallium, is a big part of what makes us human: art, literature and science would not exist had this most fascinating part of our brain not emerged in some less intelligent ancestor in prehistoric times. But when did this occur and what were these ancestors? Unexpectedly,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

25 August 2010

Freeze or run? Not that simple

Fear can make you run, it can make you fight, and it can glue you to the spot. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Monterotondo, Italy and GlaxoSmithKline in Verona, Italy, have identified not only the part of the brain but the specific type of neurons that determine…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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5 August 2010

Constant overlap

During cell division, microtubules emanating from each of the spindle poles meet and overlap in the spindle’s midzone. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, have uncovered the molecular mechanism that determines the extent of this overlap. In a…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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3 August 2010 These electron microscopy images show mitochondria in a normal cell (top) and a close-up of a mitochondrion with structural defects, in a cell that cannot produce IRPs (bottom). Image credits: Bruno Galy/ EMBL

Supply and demand

Most organisms need iron to survive, but too much iron is toxic, and can cause fatal organ failure. The same is true inside cells, where iron balance must also be maintained. In a study published today in Cell Metabolism, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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4 July 2010 The Fly Digital Embryo at different developmental stages, with cell nuclei coloured according to how fast they were moving (from blue for the slowest to orange for the fastest). The fruit fly embryo is magnified around 250 times. IMAGE: Philipp Keller

Digital Embryo gains wings

The scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, who ‘fathered’ the Digital Embryo have now given it wings, creating the Fly Digital Embryo. In work published today in Nature Methods, they were able to capture fruit fly development on film, and were the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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24 June 2010 These microscopy images show that a protein from the NSL complex (green) and MOF (red) both bind to all chromosomes in male (right) and female (left) fruit flies - overlap is shown in purple. On the male X chromosome, MOF binds not only to promoter regions but also to the body of the genes, generating a brighter signal (pink). Image credits: Akhtar/EMBL.

A life-changing partnership

Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the Max-Planck Institute of Immunobiology Freiburg have identified a novel protein complex that regulates around 4000 genes in the fruit fly Drosophila and likely plays an important role in mammals, too.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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31 May 2010 This microscopy image shows that, in a mouse embryo, MiR451 (dark purple) is produced only in the liver, where red blood cells are being formed at this developmental stage. Image credits: Kasper Rasmussen/EMBL

Making enough red blood cells

Red blood cells, the delivery men that take oxygen to cells all around the body, have short lives. To keep enough of them in circulation, the human body produces around 2 million of these cells every second – even more in response to challenges like severe blood loss. In a study published today…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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2 May 2010 These microscopy images show the region of the embryo larva that will develop into the adult fruit fly’s wing. In cells genetically manipulated so that PR-DUB cannot remove the gene-silencing tag (left), a gene which would normally be silenced becomes turned on (red) - a situation which is corrected when PR-DUB’s activity is restored (right). Image credits: J.Mueller/EMBL.

Tags on, tags off

During embryonic development, proteins called Polycomb group complexes turn genes off when and where their activity must not be present, preventing specialised tissues and organs from forming in the wrong places. They also play an important role in processes like stem cell differentiation and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

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8 April 2010 This image shows the 5,372 samples as dots colour-coded for the six major clusters identified by comparing gene expression profiles. The left and right panels of the figure are projections of the same three-dimensional shape viewed from two different perspectives. Image credit: Brazma / EMBL.

Variations on the genetic theme

Just like members of an orchestra are active at different times although playing the same piece of music, every cell in our body contains the same genetic sequence but expresses this differently to give rise to cells and tissues with specialised properties. By integrating gene expression data from…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

1 April 2010 Each of these large images of dividing cells is composed of several microscopy images of human cells in which different individual genes were silenced. The smaller images are placed according to genes’ effects: images for genes that affect chromosomes make up the chromosomes (red/pink), while the mitotic spindle (green) is composed of images for genes that affect it. IMAGE: Thomas Walter & Mayumi Isokane / EMBL

Movies for the human genome

Name a human gene, and you’ll find a movie online showing you what happens to cells when it is switched off. This is the resource that researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and their collaborators in the Mitocheck consortium are making freely…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

18 March 2010

What makes us unique? Not only our genes

Once the human genome was sequenced in 2001, the hunt was on for the genes that make each of us unique. But scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and Yale and Stanford Universities in the USA, have found that we differ from each other mainly because…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

4 March 2010

Bacterial balance that keeps us healthy

The thousands of bacteria, fungi and other microbes that live in our gut are essential contributors to our good health. They break down toxins, manufacture some vitamins and essential amino acids, and form a barrier against invaders. A study published today in Nature shows that, at 3.3 million,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

31 January 2010

MicroRNA: a glimpse into the past

The last ancestor we shared with worms, which roamed the seas around 600 million years ago, may already have had a sophisticated brain that released hormones into the blood and was connected to various sensory organs. The evidence comes not from a newly found fossil but from the study of microRNAs…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

26 January 2010 This image shows the three-dimensional structure of Death-Associated Protein Kinase (green and yellow) when bound to calmodulin (violet and blue). It was obtained by X-ray crystallography. Image credit: Mathias Wilmanns / EMBL

How to shoot the messenger

Cells rely on a range of signalling systems to communicate with each other and to control their own internal workings. Scientists from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Hamburg, Germany, have now found a way to hack into a vital communications system, raising the possibility of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

19 January 2010 Image credit: Rachel Melwig & Christine Panagiotidis / EMBL

Membrane-coat proteins: bacteria have them too

Although they are present almost everywhere, on land and sea, a group of related bacteria in the superphylum Planctomycetes-Verrucomicrobia-Chlamydiae, or PVC, have remained in relative obscurity ever since they were first described about a decade ago. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2010

sciencescience-technology

10 December 2009 These microscopy images show the cellular reprogramming uncovered by EMBL scientists. On the left is an ovary of a normal adult female mouse, with a close-up (top left) showing the typical female granulosa cells. When the Foxl2 gene was silenced in these cells (right, top right: close-up), they took on the characteristics of Sertoli cells, the cells normally found in testes of male mice. Image credit: Treier / EMBL

The Battle of the Sexes

Is it a boy or a girl? Expecting parents may be accustomed to this question, but contrary to what they may think, the answer doesn’t depend solely on their child’s sex chromosomes. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany and the Medical Research…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

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10 December 2009 These microscopy images demonstrate the effects of Notch signalling on the hearts of newborn mice (top) and of adult mice after a heart attack (bottom). In a normal neonatal heart (top left), the two major heart chambers (ventricles) are clearly separated by tissue (septum). But when Notch signalling was inactivated in an embryo’s heart muscle cells, the septum between the ventricles of the newborn mouse’s heart was incomplete (asterisk). The same defect commonly occurs in humans with congenital heart disease, often leading to circulatory distress. In the images of adult hearts (bottom), healthy tissue is shown in red and damaged tissue in blue. Normally (bottom left), a heart attack causes extensive tissue damage to the left ventricle (right-hand cavity), but mice in which Notch was re-activated after the heart attack had reduced tissue damage (bottom right) and improved cardiac function. Image credit: EMBL

From fruit fly wings to heart failure. Why Not(ch)?

Almost a century after it was discovered in fruit flies with notches in their wings, the Notch signalling pathway may come to play an important role in the recovery from heart attacks. In a study published today in Circulation Research, scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL)…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

8 November 2009

Drought resistance explained

Much as adrenaline coursing through our veins drives our body’s reactions to stress, the plant hormone abscisic acid (ABA) is behind plants’ responses to stressful situations such as drought, but how it does so has been a mystery for years. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

4 November 2009 fluorescence microscopy images of fruit fly embryos

Deciphering the regulatory code

Embryonic development is like a well-organised building project, with the embryo’s DNA serving as the blueprint from which all construction details are derived. Cells carry out different functions according to a developmental plan, by expressing, i.e. turning on, different combinations of genes.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

30 September 2009 In the centre, a structural model determined by X-ray crystallography shows how the two tags (attached to a short section of the histone protein – all in cyan) fit neatly into the Brdt pocket (purple). In the background image, hypercompaction by Brdt causes relatively diffuse chromatin (stained blue inside the nuclei of two cells on the top left) to compact and clump together (two on the bottom right).

Putting the squeeze on sperm DNA

In the quest for speed, olympic swimmers shave themselves or squeeze into high-tech super-suits. In the body, sperm are the only cells that swim and, as speed is crucial to fertility, have developed their own ways to become exceptionally streamlined. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

21 September 2009 This microscopy image, taken ten days after injury, shows that the muscle fibres of normal mice (left) had re-grown, while in mice which couldn’t boost C/EBPβ production (right) there were still many fibres that had not regenerated (arrowheads), and the tissue had a number of scars (arrows).

To regenerate muscle, cellular garbage men must become builders

For scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Monterotondo, Italy, what seemed like a disappointing result turned out to be an important discovery. Their findings, published online this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), provide…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

13 September 2009 In normal skin (left), the stem cells at the base, shown in green, differentiate into skin cells, shown in red. In mice whose skin has neither C/EBPα nor C/EBPβ (middle), this differentiation is blocked: green-labeled stem cells appear in upper layers of skin, and there are no differentiated skin cells (no red staining). This also happens at the initial stages of basal cell carcinomas. In skin where C/EBPα is present but has lost its capacity to interact with E2F, a molecule that regulates the cell cycle (right), skin cells start differentiating abnormally, before they have properly exited the stem cell ‘program’ (yellow/orange). This is similar to what is observed in the initial stages of squamous cell carcinomas, a more aggressive and invasive skin tumour.

How stem cells make skin

Stem cells have a unique ability: when they divide, they can either give rise to more stem cells, or to a variety of specialised cell types. In both mice and humans, a layer of cells at the base of the skin contains stem cells that can develop into the specialised cells in the layers above.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

13 August 2009

Raising the alarm when DNA goes bad

Our genome is constantly under attack from things like UV light and toxins, which can damage or even break DNA strands and ultimately lead to cancer and other diseases. Scientists have known for a long time that when DNA is damaged, a key enzyme sets off a cellular ‘alarm bell’ to alert the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

2 August 2009

Scientists open doors to diagnosis of emphysema

Chronic inflammatory lung diseases like chronic bronchitis and emphysema are a major global health problem, and the fourth leading cause of death and disability in developed countries, with smoking accounting for 90% of the risk for developing them. Work by scientists at the European Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

7 July 2009

Scientists identify cholesterol-regulating genes

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the University of Heidelberg, Germany, have come a step closer to understanding how cholesterol levels are regulated. In a study published today in the journal Cell Metabolism, the researchers identified 20 genes that are involved…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

25 June 2009 The microscope image of the dorsal closure of a fly embryo shows alternating stripes of epithelial cells with aligned microtubule bundles (green) and epithelial cells treated with a microtubule-destroying drug (blue). Labelled in red is the protein actin that lines the border of cells, particularly the amnioserosa cells occupying the eye-shaped opening.

Uncovering how cells cover gaps

Researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, came a step closer to understanding how cells close gaps not only during embryonic development but also during wound healing. Their study, published this week in the journal Cell, uncovers a fundamental…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

23 June 2009 Lattice maps for immature HIV particles. The 3D computer reconstruction shows the immature Gag lattice of HIV that matures to form the protein shell of the infecious virus. Maps are shown in perspective such that hexamers on the rear surface of the particle appear smaller. The side of the particle toward the viewer lacks ordered Gag. IMAGE: John Briggs/EMBL

New electron microscopy images reveal the assembly of HIV

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the University Clinic Heidelberg, Germany, have produced a three-dimensional reconstruction of HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), which shows the structure of the immature form of the virus at unprecedented detail. Immature HIV is…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

9 June 2009 Reflect applied to a pubmed webpage. Protein names found in the text are highlighted in blue, chemicals in orange. Pop-up windows provide extra information on the biomolecules.

New EMBL service makes web browsing efficient for biologists

The life sciences are scaling up and produce huge amounts of data and new literature at an amazing pace. The European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) now offers a new free service to help researchers, teachers and students keep up-to-date with scientific literature on the web, especially when…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

28 May 2009

Sugarcoating fruit fly development

Proteins are the executive agents that carry out all processes in a cell. Their activity is controlled and modified with the help of small chemical tags that can be dynamically added to and removed from the protein. 25 years after its first discovery, researchers at the European Molecular Biology…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

30 April 2009

Recycler protein helps prevent disease

Recycling is important not only on a global scale, but also at the cellular level, since key molecules tend to be available in limited numbers. This means a cell needs to have efficient recycling mechanisms. Researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and Heidelberg University,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

24 February 2009 A full body shot of Medaka juveniles, taken by Philipp Keller, from the lab of Ernst Stelzer at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), with a newly developed microscope called Digital Scanned Laser Light Sheet Fluorescence Microscope. Picture credits: Philipp Keller, Stelzer Group, EMBL

Picture Release

‘Useless fish with big eyes’. This is what Medaka, the name of the Japanese killifish in the pictures, means in Japan where it originally comes from. While its eyes are undeniably big, the fish has proven remarkably useful for scientists. It is a simple model organism, amenable to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

4 February 2009 High resolution image of the key domain of the influenza virus polymerase. The active site responsible for RNA cleavage is shown in red. Its activity is crucial for the virus to multiply in human cells

New findings reveal how influenza virus hijacks human cells

Influenza is and remains a disease to reckon with. Seasonal epidemics around the world kill several hundred thousand people every year. In the light of looming pandemics if bird flu strains develop the ability to infect humans easily, new drugs and vaccines are desperately sought. Researchers at…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

25 January 2009

Re-write the textbooks: transcription is bidirectional

Genes that contain instructions for making proteins make up less than 2% of the human genome. Yet, for unknown reasons, most of our genome is transcribed into RNA. The same is true for many other organisms that are easier to study than humans. Researchers in the groups of Lars Steinmetz at the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2009

sciencescience-technology

3 December 2008

Picture Release

Cell division is one of the most fundamental processes of life. It explains how one cell can give rise to an organism of several million cells, it determines the shape of different life forms and it underpins our body’s capacity to heal when injured. Often we only notice how important cell…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

20 November 2008

Uncovering secrets of life in the ocean

The best-selling novel The swarm captured the imagination of countless readers with the fascination of marine life. But it also showed how little we understand life in the depth of the ocean. Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the Max Planck Institute (MPI)…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

22 October 2008

Picture Release

What at the first sight could be pictures of planets or other cosmic structures are actually microscope images of balls (cysts) of human kidney cells. They were taken by Emmanuel Reynaud, in the group of Ernst Stelzer at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), with a widefield microscope.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

11 July 2008

Teaching old drugs new tricks

Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) discovered a new way to make use of drugs’ unwanted side effects. They developed a computational method that compares how similar the side effects of different drugs are and predicts how likely the drugs act on the same target…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

9 July 2008

Zooming in on genetic shuffling

Genetic recombination, the process by which sexually reproducing organisms shuffle their genetic material when producing germ cells, leads to offspring with a new genetic make-up and influences the course of evolution. In the current issue of Nature, researchers at the European Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

4 July 2008

New research sheds light on the molecular basis of crib death

Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) is a condition that unexpectedly and unexplainably takes the lives of seemingly healthy babies aged between a month and a year. Now researchers of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Monterotondo, Italy, have developed a mouse model of the so-called crib…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

20 June 2008

Scientists fix bugs in our understanding of evolution

What makes a human different from a chimp? Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) have come one important step closer to answering such evolutionary questions correctly. In the current issue of Science they uncover…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

30 May 2008

X chromosome exposed

Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) in Hinxton, UK, have revealed new insights into how sex chromosomes are regulated. A chromatin modifying enzyme helps compensate for the fact that…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

7 May 2008

Platypus genome sequence published

UK-based researchers at the Medical Research Council Functional Genomics Unit in Oxford and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute in Cambridge have revealed the genetic makeup of the one of the world’s strangest mammals. They have analysed the DNA…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

4 May 2008

Getting wise to the influenza virus’ tricks

Influenza is currently a grave concern for governments and health organisations around the world. Now one of the tactics used by influenza virus to take over the machinery of infected cells has been laid bare by structural biologists at the EMBL, the joint Unit of Virus Host-Cell Interaction of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

8 April 2008

An unexpected way to cause leukaemia

Leukaemia – cancer of blood or bone marrow – is caused by mutations that allow defective blood cells to accumulate and displace healthy blood. To devise effective therapies it is crucial to know which mutations cause leukaemia and which cell type gives rise to leukaemic cells. Researchers from…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

5 February 2008

Europe’s most common genetic disease is a liver disorder

Much less widely known than the dangerous consequences of iron deficiencies is the fact that too much iron can also cause problems. The exact origin of the genetic iron overload disorder hereditary hemochromatosis [HH] has remained elusive. In a joint effort, researchers from the European Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

8 January 2008

Life savers in the gut

Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) have discovered that proteins that regulate the body’s iron household play a vital role in making sure enough nutrients and water are absorbed in the intestine. Mice lacking these proteins suffer from weight loss and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2008

sciencescience-technology

17 December 2007

An ambulance man for muscle damage

It does not take much to injure a muscle. Sometimes one sudden, inconsiderate movement does the job. Unfortunately, damaged muscles are not as efficient at repair as other tissues such as bone. Researchers of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s Mouse Biology Unit (EMBL), Italy, and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

5 December 2007

The closest look ever at native human tissue

Seeing proteins in their natural environment and interactions inside cells has been a longstanding goal. Using an advanced microscopy technique called cryo-electron tomography, researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) have visualised proteins responsible for cell-cell…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

2 December 2007

How cells keep in shape

Cells in our body come in various shapes and sizes. Each cell is shaped in such a way as to optimise it for a specific function. When things go wrong and a cell does not adopt its dedicated shape, its function can be impaired and the cell can cause problems in the body. Researchers at […]

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

21 October 2007

Scientists uncover how hormones achieve their effects

New insights into the cellular signal chain through which pheromones stimulate mating in yeast have been gained by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL]. Similar signal chains are found in humans, where they are involved in many important processes such as the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

15 September 2007

A molecule that protects from neuronal disorders

Many neuronal disorders, including epilepsy, schizophrenia and lissencephaly ─ a form of mental retardation ─ result from abnormal migration of nerve cells during the development of the brain. Researchers from the Mouse Biology Unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Italy,…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

9 August 2007

A unique arrangement for egg cell division

Which genes are passed on from mother to child is decided very early on during the maturation of the egg cell in the ovary. In a cell division process that is unique to egg cells, half of the chromosomes are eliminated from the egg before it is fertilised. Using a powerful microscope, researchers…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

30 July 2007

Uncovering the secrets of the deep

The UniProt Consortium, which includes the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), has added a new database repository for metagenomic and environmental data to its family of protein sequence databases. Metagenomics is the large-scale genomic…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

9 July 2007

A stepwise retreat: how immune cells catch pathogens

To protect us from disease our immune system employs macrophages, cells that roam our body in search of disease-causing bacteria. With the help of long tentacle-like protrusions, macrophages can catch suspicious particles, pull them towards their cell bodies, internalise and destroy them. Using a…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

8 July 2007

A gene that protects from kidney disease

Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the University of Michigan have discovered a gene that protects us against a serious kidney disease. In the current online issue of Nature Genetics they report that mutations in the gene cause nephronopthisis (NPHP) in humans and…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

29 June 2007

Modern brains have an ancient core

Hormones control growth, metabolism, reproduction and many other important biological processes. In humans, and all other vertebrates, the chemical signals are produced by specialised brain centres such as the hypothalamus and secreted into the blood stream that distributes them around the body.…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

22 June 2007

New compound effectively treats fungal infections

A new mechanism to attack hard-to-treat fungal infections has been revealed by scientists from the biotech company Anacor Pharmaceuticals Inc., California, and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL] outstation in Grenoble, France. In the current issue of Science they describe…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

15 June 2007

Casting the molecular net

Scientists at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital (Canada), the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (Germany), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) have created a new computational method called NetworKIN. This method uses biological networks to better…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

14 June 2007

New findings challenge established views about human genome

The ENCyclopedia Of DNA Elements (ENCODE), an international research consortium organised by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today published the results of its exhaustive, four-year effort to build a “parts list” of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

10 June 2007

Researchers shed light on shrinking of chromosomes

A human cell contains an enormous 1.8 metres of DNA partitioned into 46 chromosomes. These have to be copied and distributed equally into two daughter cells at every division. Condensation, the shortening of chromosomes, allows the cell to handle such huge amounts of genetic material during cell…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

5 June 2007

Uncovering the molecular basis of obesity

Why does the same diet make some of us gain more weight than others? The answer could be a molecule called Bsx, as scientists from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), the German Institute for Nutrition (DIFE), Potsdam, and the University of Cincinnati report in the current issue of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

3 June 2007

New insights into the neural basis of anxiety

People who suffer from anxiety tend to interpret ambiguous situations, situations that could potentially be dangerous but not necessarily so, as threatening. Researchers from the Mouse Biology Unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Italy have now uncovered the neural basis for…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

16 May 2007

Mechanism of microRNAs deciphered

Over 30% of our genes are under the control of small molecules called microRNAs. They prevent specific genes from being turned into protein and regulate many crucial processes like cell division and development, but how they do so has remained unclear. Now researchers from the European Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

4 May 2007

A matter of force

When a cell divides, normally the result is two identical daughter cells. In some cases however, cell division leads to two cells with different properties. This is called asymmetric cell division and plays an important role in embryonic development and the self-renewal of stem cells. Researchers…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

20 April 2007

The origin of the brain lies in a worm

The rise of the central nervous system (CNS) in animal evolution has puzzled scientists for centuries. Vertebrates, insects and worms evolved from the same ancestor, but their CNSs are different and were thought to have evolved only after their lineages had split during evolution. Researchers from…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

6 March 2007

An architectural plan of the cell

Like our body every cell has a skeleton that provides it with a shape, confers rigidity and protects its fragile inner workings. The cytoskeleton is built of long protein filaments that assemble into networks whose overall architecture and fine detail can only be revealed with high resolution…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

4 March 2007

A clearer view on biology

The European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) has developed a new computational tool that makes images obtained with cutting-edge microscopes even sharper. The technological advance and its applications are published in this week’s online issue of the journal Nature Methods. Since the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

25 February 2007

A first glimpse of the influenza replication machine

In 1918, 50 million people died during a worldwide influenza pandemic caused by mutation of a bird-specific strain of the influenza virus. Recently H5N1, another highly infectious avian strain has caused outbreaks of bird flu around the world. There is great concern that this virus might also…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

12 February 2007

A signal that protects the liver from hepatitis and cancer

Liver cancer is one of the deadliest cancers worldwide; every year sees more than 400,000 new cases, and most of the victims die in less than one year. Despite extensive research, the underlying molecular mechanisms of the disease are poorly understood. A new study by researchers from the Mouse…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

11 February 2007

Putting an old drug to a new use

We all know that iron deficiencies are dangerous, but also too much iron is bad for our health. Our body stores excess iron in various tissues, where it can lead to organ failure and even death if not treated before irreversible damage has occurred. Researchers from the Innsbruck Medical…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

2 February 2007

Investigating the invisible life in our environment

Microorganisms make up more than a third of the Earth’s biomass. They are found in water, on land and even in our bodies, recycling nutrients, influencing the planet’s climate or causing diseases. Still, we know surprisingly little about the smallest beings that colonise Earth. A new…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

8 January 2007

Getting to the bottom of memory

Phone numbers, the way to work, granny’s birthday – our brain with its finite number of nerve cells can store incredible amounts of information. At the bottom of memory lies a complex network of molecules. To understand how this network brings about one of the most remarkable capacities of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2007

sciencescience-technology

29 December 2006

Roadworks on the motorways of the cell

A cell is a busy place. In a permanent rush hour, molecules are transported along a dynamic motorway system made up of filaments called microtubules. Microtubules constantly grow and shrink and are rapidly assembled wherever a cargo needs to go, but during this transportation process they need to…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

2 November 2006

Helping muscle regenerate

Muscle wasting can occur at all ages as the result of genetic defects, heart failure, spinal injury or cancer. A therapy to cure the loss of muscle mass and strength, which has a severe impact on patients’ lives, is desperately sought. Blocking a central signal molecule, researchers from the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

27 September 2006

How nature tinkers with the cellular clock

The life of a cell is all about growing and dividing at the right time. That is why the cell cycle is one of the most tightly regulated cellular processes. A control system with several layers adjusts when key components of the cell cycle machinery are produced, activated and degraded to make sure…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

3 September 2006

Lost in the labyrinth

Blood cells have limited lifespans, which means that they must be continually replaced by calling up reserves and turning these into the blood cell types needed by the body. Claus Nerlov and his colleagues at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) unit in Monterotondo, Italy, in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

25 August 2006

A wandering eye

Eyes are among the earliest recognisable structures in an embryo; they start off as bulges on the sides of tube-shaped tissue that will eventually become the brain. Researchers from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg have now discovered that cells are programmed to make…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

25 August 2006

A switch between life and death

Cells in an embryo divide at an amazing rate to build a whole body, but this growth needs to be controlled. Otherwise the result may be defects in embryonic development or cancer in adults. Controlling growth requires that some cells divide while others die; their fates are determined by signals…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

6 August 2006

Alleviating the burden of Multiple Sclerosis

Depression, coordination and speech problems, muscle weakness and disability are just a few of the symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis (MS). Researchers from the Mouse Biology Unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Italy and the Department of Neuropathology at the Faculty of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

16 June 2006

Cracking a virus protection shield

Ebola, measles and rabies are serious threats to public health in developing countries. Despite different symptoms all of the diseases are caused by the same class of viruses that unlike most other living beings carry their genetic information on a single RNA molecule instead of a double strand of…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

29 May 2006

New potential drug target in tuberculosis

Tuberculosis remains one of the deadliest threats to public health. Every year two million people die of the disease, which is caused by the microorganism Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Roughly one third of the world’s population is infected and more and more bacterial strains have developed…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

16 March 2006

A balancing act between the sexes

Recent research at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) reveals new insights into how cells achieve equality between the sexes. A new link discovered between the membrane surrounding the nucleus and the male X-chromosome in fruit flies may play a crucial role in determining how active…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

16 February 2006

Waking a sleeping virus

A detailed structural picture of a molecule that plays a key role in activating the Epstein Barr Virus in human cells has now been obtained by researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the Institut de Virologie Moléculaire et Structurale (IVMS), associated with the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

22 January 2006

The closest look ever at the cell’s machines

Today researchers in Germany announce they have finished the first complete analysis of the “molecular machines” in one of biology’s most important model organisms: S. cerevisiae (baker’s yeast). The study from the biotechnology company Cellzome, in collaboration with the…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

11 January 2006

The giant protein titin helps build muscles

Imagine grabbing two snakes by the tail so that they can’t wriggle off in opposite directions. Scientists at the Hamburg Outstation of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and collaborators from King’s College in London have now discovered that something similar happens to a…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2006

sciencescience-technology

21 December 2005

A key that opens cells to the deadly malaria parasite

Researchers at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB) in India and a unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in France have made a key discovery about a molecule that helps the malaria parasite infect human cells. India is one of the countries…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

24 November 2005

The earliest animals had human-like genes

Species evolve at very different rates, and the evolutionary line that produced humans seems to be among the slowest. The result, according to a new study by scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL], is that our species has retained characteristics of a very ancient ancestor…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

15 November 2005

Many needles, many haystacks

Most of what happens in cells is the work of machines that contain dozens of molecules, chiefly proteins. With the completion of human and other genomes, researchers now have a nearly complete ‘parts list’ of such machines; what’s lacking is the manual telling where all the pieces…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

13 November 2005

Limiting the damage in stroke

Scientists at the Universities of Heidelberg and Ulm and a unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Monterotondo, Italy, have discovered that a specific signal within brain cells may determine whether they live or die after a stroke. Their study, published online (November 13) by…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

6 October 2005

Defusing dangerous mutations

Mutations in genes are the basis of evolution, so we owe our existence to them. Most mutations are harmful, however, because they cause cells to build defective proteins. So cells have evolved quality control mechanisms that recognize and counteract genetic mistakes. Now scientists of the Molecular…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

4 September 2005

A new link between stem cells and tumors

Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg and the Institute of Biomedical Research of the Parc Científic de Barcelona (IRB-PCB) have now added key evidence to claims that some types of cancer originate with defects in stem cells. The study, reported this week in…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

25 August 2005

A double punch for female survival

Achieving equality between the sexes can be a challenge even for single cells. Since evolution began removing bits of male DNA to create the ‘Y’ chromosome, males have had a single copy of certain key genes on the X chromosome, whereas females have two. Normally this would lead females…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

13 July 2005

Actin moves chromosomes

Microtubules need a helping hand to find chromosomes in dividing egg cells, scientists have discovered. Although it was generally accepted that microtubules act alone as the cellular ropes to pull chromosomes into place, a new study by researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL)…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

1 July 2005

Trees, vines and nets: microbial evolution changes its face

EBI researchers have changed our view of 4 billion years of microbial evolution. Christos Ouzounis and colleagues have gained intriguing quantitative insights into how gene families are transferred, not only ‘vertically’ through passage from one organism to its progeny, but also…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

21 April 2005

Whale bones and farm soil: Sequencing biodiversity

Instead of sequencing the genome of one organism, why not sequence a drop of sea water, a gram of farm soil or even a sunken whale skeleton? Scientists at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg and their US collaborators have done just that, and the result is a new…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

11 April 2005

A new way to share models of biological systems

Today sees the launch of BioModels, the world’s first database of annotated biological models. BioModels is the result of a collaboration led by the European Bioinformatics Institute (UK) and the SBML Team, an international group that develops opensource standards to describe biological…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

3 February 2005

Biology in four dimensions

Most things that happen in the cell are the work of ‘molecular machines’ – complexes of proteins that carry out important cellular functions. Until now, scientists didn’t have a clear idea of when proteins form these machines – are these complexes pre-fabricated or put…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

25 January 2005

How do cells travel through our bodies?

One of the most basic yet least understood processes in our bodies is how cells crawl along tissues. This behavior is essential to the formation of an embryo and other processes, but it must be tightly controlled. A disturbance can lead to the spread of cancer cells or diseases like Spina…

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

2005

sciencescience-technology

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