Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
The capacity of tumours to spread to other organs is one of their most dangerous attributes. A study of how cancer cells settle in new places shows that they send out envoys to prepare the ground for them.
Domestication and selective breeding have transformed wolves into the diversity of dogs we see today. The sequence of the genome of one breed adds to our understanding of mammalian biology and genome evolution.
Computer simulations predict that global warming will weaken the ocean circulation that transports heat from the tropics to higher latitudes in the North Atlantic. Such an effect has now been detected.
Many of the biochemical events that occur in a cell are performed by huge complexes of proteins and nucleic acids. A cunning approach promises to show how the components convene to make a functioning ‘machine’.
The stream of revelations from Mars continues. The latest news — the discovery of clays in ancient terrains — helps to fill in the picture of the past existence of liquid water on the planet's surface.
Just under the cell surface, proteins engage in an intricate ballet to drive a transport process called endocytosis. Much is known about the individual dancers, but now the choreography is revealed.
How do the lipids and proteins of the cell membrane interact to create a functioning barrier for the cell? A high-resolution structure of a membrane protein reveals intimate contacts with its lipid neighbours.
The aquaporins are membrane channels that were originally identified as regulators of a cell's water balance. A member of the aquaporin family is now implicated as a central agent in controlling fat metabolism.
The electrical resistance of some manganese oxides takes a tumble when they become magnetic. Close examination confirms the interplay of conduction electrons and lattice vibrations that contributes to this effect.
Distinguishing self from non-self is the underlying basis of immunity. Intriguingly, the genetic system that governs a natural process akin to tissue transplantation in vertebrates has been characterized in an invertebrate.
A quantum computer needs a constant supply of ‘qubits’ in a known state. A nuclear magnetic resonance experiment that cools qubits by pumping entropy into a heat bath is a step closer to that goal.
Proteins are often produced at their site of action, but the RNAs from which they are made must be kept inactive until they reach the right spot. It seems this ‘silencing’ of RNA is linked to its transport around the cell.
Chaos, goes conventional wisdom, can only be a malign influence in telecommunications. But a technique that uses chaotically varying signals to transmit information more privately may help it shed that bad-boy image.
The perfect lens would immaculately reproduce an image of an object, with no light losses in the transition. The strange optical properties of a gold nanostructure bring the prospect of such a component into sharper focus.
In female mammals, one of two X chromosomes has to be shut down during early development. To what extent does this ‘imprinted X-chromosome inactivation’ involve the history of the chromosome?
