Some cells, such as immune cells, are highly mobile—they constantly remodel their shape, migrate toward a wound that needs to be closed or chase down bacteria in the bloodstream. This mobility is ...

Researchers have visualized at the molecular level how formins bind to the ends of actin filaments. This allowed them to uncover how formins mediate the addition of new actin molecules to a growing ...

The formation of the branched actin networks is essential for cell polarity, but it remains unclear how the debranching activity of actin filaments contributes to this process. Here, we showed that an ...

Researchers at Kanazawa University report in eLife on deciphering the actin structure-dependent preferential cooperative binding of cofilin. The actin filament is a double-stranded helical structure ...

It forms networks of thin, flexible filaments that affect the shape, stiffness, and movement of cells. Studies have found that aging alters actin expression, disrupting the cytoskeleton’s functions, ...

Tiny things matter – for instance, one amino acid can completely alter the architecture of the cell. Researchers at the Universities of Göttingen and Warwick investigated the structure and mechanics ...

Cancer cells are subjected to high mechanical pressure that leads to a rupture of the nuclear envelope when migrating through narrow tissue structures, as in the case of metastasis. DNA would normally ...