NIST researcher Elizabeth Strychalski’s research group is helping to establish the measurements and standards needed for progress in engineering biology, also known as synthetic biology. For over a ...

A human cell is a Rube Goldberg machine like no other, full of biological chain reactions that make the difference between life and death. Understanding these delicate relationships and how they go ...

Lipids are fatty molecules that play critical roles in cell function, including membrane structure, energy storage and nutrient absorption. Most lipids are made in a cell organelle called the ...

No one saw the blob takeover coming. In 2009 a team of biophysicists led by Anthony A. Hyman of the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany, were studying ...

Five years ago, scientists watched in wonder as synthetic bacteria grew and split into daughter cells. The bacteria’s extremely stripped-down genome still supported its entire life cycle. It was a ...