100 years biochemical sciences tutorial
Neurons come in a bewildering variety of shapes and sizes, with the structure of each type underlying its specific functions. A major preoccupation of developmental biologists is to…
Babies possess the ability to predict what will happen in their environment based on intuition about gravity, motion, and mass of objects. This has lead to the idea…
During perceptual decision-making, animals need to accumulate sensory evidence over time, but the underlying neural processes remain poorly understood. Here we combine behavioral experiments and whole-brain imaging in…
Injury to the central nervous system (brain or spinal cord) usually leads to irreversible loss of function. This is because many injured neurons die and few if any…
In many vertebrates, neural circuits undergo substantial reorganization in early postnatal life. This reorganization strengthens some neuron-to-neuron connections, while other neuronal connections are weakened by synapse elimination. It…
In the late 1970’s, the KGB inducted ricin into the “cloak and dagger” hall-of-fame by turning a more or less innocuous umbrella tip into their assassin’s weapon of…
Decades ago, pioneering studies in cats and rodents identified regions within an ancient part of the brain, the hypothalamus, that are sufficient to increase or reduce appetite. Stimulating…
Organisms must accumulate scarce nutrients from their environments to survive. This often involves moving molecules up a concentration gradient, which is entropically unfavorable. Active transport proteins embedded in…
For embryos to develop properly, cells must communicate with one another over long ranges through diffusive chemical signals called morphogens. These signals act as instructive cues for the…
Bacillus subtilis is a bacterium with many talents. Some cells devote themselves to exploration, abandoning their relatives to live as swimming ‘motile’ cells. Others instead choose a cooperative,…
