Biological sciences articles within Nature Communications

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  • Review Article |

    Hair cells of the inner ear transduce vibrations of the basilar membrane into electrical signals by a process known as mechanotransduction. Recent advances in genetic and molecular tools have led to an improved understanding of mechanotransduction as Peng and colleagues summarize in this Review.

    • Anthony W. Peng
    • , Felipe T. Salles
    •  & Anthony J. Ricci

  • Article |

    Surface characterization of soft materialsin situis challenging due to the importance of non-covalent interactions. Now, a new chemical imaging method is reported that generates images of surface interactions by combining many molecular probe trajectories.

    • Robert Walder
    • , Nathaniel Nelson
    •  & Daniel K. Schwartz

  • Article |

    Peatlands are a sink for atmospheric carbon dioxide and make up a large soil carbon reservoir. Here, studies of the interaction between drainage and fire show that long-term carbon emissions will likely exceed rates of carbon uptake, reducing the northern peatland carbon sink.

    • M.R. Turetsky
    • , W.F. Donahue
    •  & B.W. Benscoter

  • Article |

    Erythropoietin circulates in the blood and is essential for erythropoiesis but its role in metabolic homeostasis has not been examined. Tenget al. show that when the erythropoietin receptor is only expressed in erthyroid cells, mice develop obesity and insulin resistance, suggesting that the receptor has a key role in fat mass accumulation.

    • Ruifeng Teng
    • , Oksana Gavrilova
    •  & Constance Tom Noguchi

  • Article |

    APOBEC3 is a DNA editing enzyme that is important for antiviral responses. In this study, Carmi and colleagues show that APOBEC3 editing of retrotransposon sequences in mammalian genomes is widespread, with implications for the evolution of retrotransposons.

    • Shai Carmi
    • , George M. Church
    •  & Erez Y. Levanon

  • Article |

    Large scale synapse assays can facilitate identification of drug leads. Shiet al. develop a 'synapse microarray' technology that enables sensitive, high-throughput, quantitative screening of synaptogenic events, and use it to identify novel histone deacetylase inhibitors that enhance synaptogenesis.

    • Peng Shi
    • , Mark A. Scott
    •  & Mehmet Fatih Yanik

  • Article
    | Open Access

    MicroRNAs bind to the 3′-untranslated region of genes to regulate expression. In this study, an RNA-binding protein, RMB38, is shown to selectively regulate the access of some microRNAs to their targets, and control the expression of some p53 target genes.

    • Nicolas Léveillé
    • , Ran Elkon
    •  & Reuven Agami

  • Article
    | Open Access

    During cell division, a cytoplasmic bridge—the midbody—forms between the nascent daughter cells, but it has been unclear under which conditions this is retained by a daughter cell or released. Now, Ettinger and colleagues show that midbody-release occurs more frequently in stem cells compared with cancer cells.

    • Andreas W. Ettinger
    • , Michaela Wilsch-Bräuninger
    •  & Wieland B. Huttner

  • Article |

    Memory retrieval followed by extinction training has been shown to erase fear memories. Flavellet al. show that this approach also erases appetitive memories in rats and results from a modification of memory reconsolidation, which could be useful for the treatment of drug addiction.

    • Charlotte R. Flavell
    • , David J. Barber
    •  & Jonathan L.C. Lee

  • Article |

    In non-NMDA glutamate receptors, intersubunit contacts within agonist binding domains affect functional desensitization. Now, NMDA receptor activation, but not desensitization, is shown to involve rearrangements at the heterodimer interface, suggesting that the intersubunit contacts of NMDA and non-NMDA receptors may have distinct functional roles.

    • William F. Borschel
    • , Swetha E. Murthy
    •  & Gabriela K. Popescu

  • Article |

    The Golgi membrane is fragmented during mitosis and is subsequently fused following cell division and this process is known to be controlled by ubiquitination. In this study, the ubiquitin ligase HACE1 is shown to be targeted to the Golgi membrane and is required for fusion after the completion of mitosis.

    • Danming Tang
    • , Yi Xiang
    •  & Yanzhuang Wang

  • Article |

    Ampullary organs are involved in electroreception, but whether these are derived from placodes, thickened ectoderm, is unclear. In this study, the ampullary organs of the primitive ray-finned fish,Polyodon spathula, are shown to develop from lateral line placodes, suggesting that this is the ancestral state in bony fishes.

    • Melinda S. Modrell
    • , William E. Bemis
    •  & Clare V.H. Baker

  • Article |

    The fusion of satellite cells to muscle fibres during adult life is required for both muscle growth and regeneration but it is unknown whether non-muscle cells contribute to this process. Now, Dellavalle and colleagues show that pericytes, cells associated with the vasculature can contribute to both growth and regeneration of muscle fibres.

    • A. Dellavalle
    • , G. Maroli
    •  & G. Cossu

  • Article |

    The role of phosphatidylinositol(4,5)bisphosphate in exocytosis is unclear. This study shows that inhibition of the p110δ isoform of PI3-kinase promotes a transient increase in phosphatidylinositol(4,5)bisphosphate, leading to a potentiation of exocytosis in chromaffin cells.

    • Peter J. Wen
    • , Shona L. Osborne
    •  & Frédéric A. Meunier

  • Article |

    The generation of human cell lines using somatic cell nuclear transfer has been difficult to achieve. In this study, Egliet al. show that while mouse eggs reprogram somatic cells within hours, human eggs arrest after nuclear transfer which may be due to a lack of genome transcription.

    • Dieter Egli
    • , Alice E. Chen
    •  & Kevin Eggan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    What controls the binding partner selection of the target of rapamycin protein, TOR, is unknown. Using theCaenorhabditis elegans tail as a model, Nukazuka et al. determine that signals of semaphorin through plexin control the binding partner selection of TOR and are required for the correct organization of rays in the tail.

    • Akira Nukazuka
    • , Shusaku Tamaki
    •  & Shin Takagi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Advanced biofuels with comparable properties to petroleum-based fuels could be microbially produced from lignocellulosic biomass. In this study,Escherichia coliis engineered to produce bisabolene, the immediate precursor of bisabolane, a biosynthetic alternative to D2 diesel.

    • Pamela P. Peralta-Yahya
    • , Mario Ouellet
    •  & Taek Soon Lee

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The risk factors associated with both ischemic and haemorrhagic stroke are not fully understood. Here a certain strain of the bacteria,Streptococcus mutans, which expresses a collagen-binding protein, is shown to be associated with haemorrhagic stroke in both animal models and human patients.

    • Kazuhiko Nakano
    • , Kazuya Hokamura
    •  & Takashi Ooshima

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A bacterial export gate complex transports flagellar proteins across the cytoplasmic membrane, but the mechanism of this process is unclear. Here, the export gate complex is revealed as a proton–protein antiporter that uses separate components of the proton motive force for different steps of the export process.

    • Tohru Minamino
    • , Yusuke V. Morimoto
    •  & Keiichi Namba

  • Article |

    In this study, fossils from the Late Cretaceous period in India are described and are assigned to the rice tribe based on phylogenetic comparison of morphological traits with modern grasses; these findings suggest that the evolutionary origins of the grass family, Poaceae, occurred earlier than previously thought.

    • V. Prasad
    • , C.A.E. Strömberg
    •  & A. Sahni

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding the genetics and physiology of domesticated species is important for crop improvement. By studying natural variation and the phenotypic traits of 413 diverse accessions of rice, Zhao et al. identify many common genetic variants that influence quantitative traits such as seed size and flowering time.

    • Keyan Zhao
    • , Chih-Wei Tung
    •  & Susan R. McCouch

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The paradigm of reservoir computing shows that, like the human brain, complex networks can perform efficient information processing. Here, a simple delay dynamical system is demonstrated that can efficiently perform computations capable of replacing a complex network in reservoir computing.

    • L. Appeltant
    • , M.C. Soriano
    •  & I. Fischer

  • Article |

    Cellular senescence is characterized by the cessation of cell growth and the expression of the p16 protein. In this study, inhibition or loss of p300, a histone acetyltransferase, is shown to result in senescence that occurs independently of p16 and is associated with histone hypoacetylation and altered replication timing.

    • Alexandre Prieur
    • , Emilie Besnard
    •  & Jean-Marc Lemaitre

  • Article |

    Recent technological advances have allowed the expansion of spermatogonial stem cellsin vitro; however, in vivo conditions are required for the full differentiation of the cells. In this study, an in vitroorgan culture system is developed that allows the differentiation of the germ cells in the laboratory.

    • Takuya Sato
    • , Kumiko Katagiri
    •  & Takehiko Ogawa

  • Article |

    Protein microarrays are useful both in basic research and also in disease monitoring and diagnosis, but their dynamic range is limited. By using plasmonic gold substrates with near-infrared fluorescent enhancement, Tabakman et al. demonstrate a multiplexed protein array with improved detection limits and dynamic range.

    • Scott M. Tabakman
    • , Lana Lau
    •  & Hongjie Dai

  • Article |

    Transforming growth factor-β blocks the activation of pro-inflammatory cytokines, in part by the degradation of Myd88. This study shows that smad ubiquitin regulator proteins are shown to mediate the destruction of Myd8 and are therefore required for the anti-inflammatory effects of transforming growth factor-β.

    • Youn Sook Lee
    • , Jin Seok Park
    •  & Seok Hee Park

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Group BStreptococcuscauses meningitis in newborn infants but how the bacterium crosses the blood-brain barrier is unknown. Here, the bacterial pili adhesion molecule, PilA, is shown to bind to collagen and promote binding of the bacteria to integrins expressed on the blood-brain endothelium.

    • Anirban Banerjee
    • , Brandon J. Kim
    •  & Kelly S. Doran

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The appearance of a new intron that splits an exon without disrupting the corresponding peptide sequence is a rare event in vertebrate genomes. Hellstenet al.demonstrate that, under certain circumstances, a functional intron can be produced in a single step by segmental genomic duplication.

    • Uffe Hellsten
    • , Julie L. Aspden
    •  & Daniel S. Rokhsar

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cell-penetrating peptides can deliver molecular cargoes into living cells, and cross biological membranes by transduction—a non-endocytic mechanism. Here, the transduction efficiency of cyclic arginine-rich peptides is shown to be higher than that of more flexible linear peptides.

    • Gisela Lättig-Tünnemann
    • , Manuel Prinz
    •  & M. Cristina Cardoso

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Many mammals are born with an immature intestinal epithelium, which adapts to a changing diet during the weaning period. Muncanet al. show that the transcriptional repressor Blimp1is expressed in the intestine of mice at birth, and that expression is lost at the transition to the weaning stage.

    • Vanesa Muncan
    • , Jarom Heijmans
    •  & Gijs R. van den Brink

  • Article |

    The development of radial progenitor cells and astroglia in the cerebral cortex depends on the microtubule cytoskeleton. Eomet al. have developed a new mouse model where the microtubules of astrocytes and radial glia cells are fluorescently tagged, facilitating the detailed study of microtubule dynamics and development in these cells.

    • Tae-Yeon Eom
    • , Amelia Stanco
    •  & E.S. Anton

  • Article |

    Harvestmen — Opiliones — are an ancient and diverse arachnid group with a limited fossil record. Here, X-ray micro-tomography of fossils reveals two new Carboniferous harvestmen species, allowing a phylogenetic analysis of these Palaeozoic Opiliones, demonstrating similarities between the fossils and extant groups.

    • Russell J. Garwood
    • , Jason A. Dunlop
    •  & Mark D. Sutton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Drosophila melanogaster larvae demonstrate chemotaxis towards odours but their navigation mechanism is poorly understood. Using computer-vision tracking, Gomez-Marinet al.show that larvae ascend odour gradients using an active sampling strategy that is analogous to sniffing in vertebrates.

    • Alex Gomez-Marin
    • , Greg J. Stephens
    •  & Matthieu Louis

  • Article |

    Modern female horses are genetically diverse but male horses are relatively homogenous. Lippoldet al. sequence the Y chromosome of nine ancient horses and detect diversity in the ancestral paternal lineage, demonstrating ancient Y-chromosomal DNA sequencing can provide insights into evolution.

    • Sebastian Lippold
    • , Michael Knapp
    •  & Michael Hofreiter

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Zebra finches are passerine birds, but their phylogenetic relationship with non-passerine birds remains controversial. By examining retroposon insertion loci in avian genomes, the authors reveal that parrots are the closest relatives of passerines, which may have implications for understanding the evolution of birdsong.

    • Alexander Suh
    • , Martin Paus
    •  & Jürgen Schmitz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Pluripotent stem cells can be generated from the somatic cells of humans and are a useful model to study disease. Here, pluripotent stem cells are made from a patient with familial Parkinson's disease, and the resulting neurons exhibit elevated levels of α-synuclein, recapitulating the molecular features of the patient's disease.

    • Michael J. Devine
    • , Mina Ryten
    •  & Tilo Kunath

  • Article |

    Chromatin is rendered silent by epigenetic marks when in proximity to telomeres, and, in yeast, this effect requires the histone-modifying enzyme Sir2. In this study, the human Sir2 family member SIRT6 is shown to modulate the telomere position effect in human cells.

    • Ruth I. Tennen
    • , Dennis J. Bua
    •  & Katrin F. Chua

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