For successful cell division, chromosomal DNA needs to be packed into compact rod-shaped structures. Defects in this process can lead to cell death or diseases like cancer. A new study has shown how ...

Cell division is an essential process for all life on Earth, yet the exact mechanisms by which cells divide during early embryonic development have remained elusive—particularly for egg-laying species ...

Researchers discovered that a long-misunderstood protein plays a key role in helping chromosomes latch onto the right “tracks” during cell division. Instead of acting like a motor, it works more like ...

Processes such as wound healing, hair growth, and the continual renewal of cells all rely on cell division. In this process, chromosomes must be evenly distributed between two daughter cells. Even ...

The journey started with an enigma in the zebrafish embryo: some endothelial cells, actively involved in the initial stages of the development of the earliest blood vessels, were dividing in an ...

Before cells can divide by mitosis, they first need to replicate all of their chromosomes, so that each of the daughter cells can receive a full set of genetic material. Scientists have until now ...

FtsZ, a highly conserved cytoskeletal protein, plays an essential role in bacterial cytokinesis by assembling into a dynamic ring‐like structure at the future division site. Its pivotal function in ...

Researchers at the Max Delbrück Center and the University of Oxford have found that a cellular housekeeping function called autophagy—by which cell components are broken down and recycled—plays a ...

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 ...