One of the challenges of working with ancient DNA samples is that damage accumulates over time, breaking up the structure of the double helix into ever smaller fragments. In the samples we’ve worked ...

Researchers at Rice University are making strides in understanding how chromosome structures change throughout the cell's life cycle. Their study on motorized processes that actively influence the ...

Chromosomes are thread-like structures located inside the nucleus of animal and plant cells. Each chromosome is made of protein and a single molecule of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Passed from ...

Researchers are making strides in understanding how chromosome structures change throughout the cell's life cycle. Researchers at Rice University are making strides in understanding how chromosome ...

As the cell proceeds through the stages of cell division (from left to right: interphase, prometaphase, metaphase, and anaphase), chromosomes become progressively more compact through a combination of ...

Scientists have discovered a new property of the molecular motors that shape our chromosomes. While six years ago they found that these so-called SMC motor proteins make long loops in our DNA, they ...

Chromosomes are masters of organization. These long strings of DNA fold down into an ensemble of compact structures that keep needed parts of the genome accessible while tucking away those that aren’t ...

Among the many marvels of life is the cell's ability to divide and thus enable organisms to grow and renew themselves. For this, the cell must duplicate its DNA – its genome – and segregate it equally ...

Microscope image of subdermal muscle from a skin of a 52,000-year-old mammoth showing remnants of mammoth nuclei. “We’ve known that tiny fragments of ancient DNA can survive for long periods of time,” ...

Agrobacterium tumefaciens magnified 15,000 times in an image captured earlier this year with a scanning electron microscope at Iowa State University's Roy J. Carver High Resolution Microscopy Facility ...