Category: Science

Wait, What? A Fungal Hypha Runs a Moving Construction Depot at Its Tip A filamentous fungus grows as a tube called a hypha. Most elongation occurs at the apex, so new membrane, wall-building enzymes, cell-wall precursors and signalling proteins must be delivered continuously to one small moving region. Near the apex sits a dynamic vesicle-rich…

Wait, What? A Living Cell Can Build a Glass Box With Nanometre-Scale Pores at Room Temperature Industrial glass manufacture suggests high temperature, melting and furnaces. Diatoms do something very different. These microscopic photosynthetic organisms construct elaborate cell walls made largely from hydrated amorphous silica. The walls are called frustules and can display ribs, pores, chambers…

Wait, What? A Bacterium Can Lose Its Cell Wall—and Still Reproduce Without the Usual Division Machine Many bacteria rely on a peptidoglycan cell wall to resist turgor pressure and maintain shape. Remove that wall under the wrong conditions and the cell lyses. But under sufficiently osmoprotective conditions, some bacteria can enter a wall-deficient state known…

Wait, What? A Growing Bacterium Can Build a Dormant Cell Inside Itself Some bacteria respond to severe nutrient limitation by entering one of the most dramatic developmental programs in microbiology: endospore formation. The vegetative cell does not simply shrink into a spore. It divides asymmetrically, creates a smaller forespore compartment, engulfs it, builds specialised protective…

Wait, What? A Tardigrade Can Lose Most of Its Water, Stop Detectable Activity, and Later Resume Life Tardigrades are famous for surviving extreme dehydration. The striking biology is not that they are indestructible. It is that some species can enter anhydrobiosis: a reversible ametabolic or near-ametabolic state triggered by severe water loss. During dehydration, the…

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