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 unique form of regulation has been observed in the unfolded protein response of S. pombe, along with a novel mechanism of post-transcriptional mRNA processing.

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

Electron microscopy has been used to produce the first three-dimensional image of the PRC2 gene-silencing complex.

Genome-wide measurements on mouse liver cells show that transcription, and a particular key transcription factor, have a smaller than expected influence on the mouse circadian system.

Histones bound to lipid droplets inside cells offer protection against bacteria in flies, and possibly mice, thus suggesting a possible new innate immunity pathway.

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 protein that can recognize regions of DNA with a high proportion of unmethylated CpG dinucleotides, and then recruit polycomb group proteins to these CpG islands, has been identified.

The first survey of the complete morphologies of nerve endings in the skin of mice has revealed enormous structural diversity.