News & Comment

Changes in RNA abundance in transcriptional condensates provide dynamic feedback on transcription.

Tatjana Trcek recounts the discovery of RNA phase separation, going back more than half a century.

Monika Fuxreiter discusses recent studies indicating that generic interactions that determine the biophysical properties of condensates are important for condensate function.

Solovei and Mirny discuss features and functions of three types of chromatin loops and the differences between them.

Agudo-Canalejo et al. now report in Nature that the process of wetting, whereby a liquid establishes a contact with a surface, underlies interactions of phase-separated droplets with autophagic membranes.

Wu and Zamore discuss models of piRNA function and suggest experimental criteria to be followed in order to validate them.

Spencer Freeman draws attention to the role of ion fluxes and vesicular solute composition in regulating dynamics of endomembranes.

Alex Holehouse describes the contributions of Nott et al. to the understanding of the mechanisms of liquid–liquid phase separation.

mRNA translation is found to occur in cytosolic stress granules, membraneless organelles that form via liquid−liquid phase separation when cells are exposed to cell-intrinsic or environmental stress.

Embryonic stem cells are found to generate fibronectin-containing extracellular vesicles that inhibit differentiation and promote pluripotency.

A team led by the late Beth Levine discovered that viral xenophagy depends on sorting nexin 5.