A 2-year field study has demonstrated that volatile compounds produced by plants when they are attacked by herbivores act as defenses by attracting predators to the herbivores and increasing the reproduction of the plants.

A pattern recognition receptor called toll-like receptor 13 detects pathogens in a manner that is different to that seen in other pathogen sensors.

Virtual reality experiments show that motorists slow down when driving in fog, but they speed up when visibility is reduced equally at all distances.

Biochemical and genetic tests have revealed that a liver protein called NTCP is a functional receptor for hepatitis B and D viruses, which should lead to an improved understanding of the infections caused by these viruses and assist the development of new intervention strategies.

A chromatin boundary factor that is only active during early embryo development has been discovered in Drosophila.

A genome-organizing protein that is present only in the olfactory system of mice has been found to orchestrate changes in the relative numbers of different odor-sensing neurons on the basis of how active these neurons are.

A combination of advanced optical imaging and cryogenic electron microscopy has been used to explore membrane fusion in a synthetic system and provide new insights into neurotransmitter release.

Similarities in the way that nucleosomes are organized into chromatin in archaea and eukaryotes suggest that chromatin might have been involved in gene regulation before its role in DNA packaging evolved.

A combination of molecular dynamics simulations and X-ray diffraction data has been used to construct more realistic models of proteins and to provide new insights into their interactions with other proteins and biomolecules.