Biological techniques articles within Nature Materials

Featured

  • Article |

    An intelligent DNA nanodevice, composed of DNA origami nanosheets and a thrombin-responsive DNA fastener, accurately delivers the appropriate dose of tissue plasminogen activator following activation by distinct thrombosis events.

    • Jue Yin
    • , Siyu Wang
    •  & Lianhui Wang

  • News & Views |

    A bioengineered model incorporating a synthetic extracellular matrix recapitulates the lymphoid tumour microenvironment, making it a valuable tool for drug testing and designing personalized therapies.

    • Akhilesh K. Gaharwar
    •  & Irtisha Singh

  • News & Views |

    Fruit flies injected with magnetic nanoparticles and genetically modified to sensitize neural circuits to the rate of change in temperature have enabled subsecond behavioural responses to magnetic stimuli and multi-channel magnetic control.

    • Michael G. Christiansen
    •  & Simone Schuerle

  • Article |

    Here the authors describe a method for remote magnetothermal stimulation of neurons that achieves subsecond behavioural responses in Drosophila fruit flies by combining magnetic nanoparticles with TRPA1-A, a rate-sensitive thermoreceptor. Tuning the properties of magnetic nanoparticles to respond to different magnetic field strengths and frequencies enables multichannel thermal magnetogenetic stimulation.

    • Charles Sebesta
    • , Daniel Torres Hinojosa
    •  & Jacob T. Robinson

  • News & Views |

    Electrically programmable Fourier-synthesized acoustic tweezers enable facile manipulation of micrometre-sized objects, colloids and living cells in a lab-on-chip device that combines high throughput with minimal invasive yet highly tunable force fields.

    • Hubert J. Krenner
    •  & Christoph Westerhausen

  • Article |

    Precise manipulation of colloids and cells is desired for material and life sciences. However, such control remains challenging without material modifications. Here, the authors achieve reversible single-particle manipulation with subwavelength resolution and high throughput using harmonic acoustics.

    • Shujie Yang
    • , Zhenhua Tian
    •  & Tony Jun Huang

  • Article |

    The influence of stress relaxation of the extracellular matrix on the formation of intestinal organoids was investigated. It was shown that a stress-relaxing synthetic matrix promotes crypt budding through increased symmetry breaking and niche cell formation.

    • Antonius Chrisnandy
    • , Delphine Blondel
    •  & Matthias P. Lutolf

  • Review Article |

    This Review highlights the progress that has been made in the development of diagnostic tools for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 in the fight against COVID-19.

    • Bhavesh D. Kevadiya
    • , Jatin Machhi
    •  & Howard E. Gendelman

  • Perspective |

    This perspective describes recent developments in genetically encoded protein contrast agents for non-invasive biological imaging, namely ultrasound, magnetic resonance and optoacoustic imaging modalities.

    • Arash Farhadi
    • , Felix Sigmund
    •  & Mikhail G. Shapiro

  • News & Views |

    Automated extrusion-based bioprinting has been shown to enable human kidney organoid generation with improved throughput, quality control and scale, representing an important step towards macro-scale kidney tissue engineering.

    • Benjamin D. Humphreys

  • Editorial |

    Over the last few years, there has been a shift towards the use of three-dimensional multicellular structures that more closely recapitulate native tissues and organs as tools to understand development, physiology and pathology.

  • News & Views |

    An immune cell population enriched in inflamed gut tissue is shown to play a role in driving CD44+ intestinal organoid proliferation, while also regulating extracellular matrix deposition and remodelling in a synthetic hydrogel platform.

    • Bauer L. LeSavage
    •  & Sarah C. Heilshorn

  • Editorial |

    After years of speculation over who would be recognized for the pioneering work on the gene editing tool CRISPR–Cas9, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry has finally been awarded to Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna.

  • News & Views |

    A bioprinting approach that utilizes organoid-forming stem cells as a living ink within hydrogels guides tissue-scale self-organization to generate more realistic gastrointestinal and vascular tissue constructs.

    • Zev J. Gartner
    •  & Jennifer L. Hu

  • Article |

    Atomic force microscopy indentation measurements of cells cultured on soft substrates may result in an underestimation of cell stiffness. A model has now been developed that takes this soft substrate effect into account, revealing that cortical cell stiffness is largely independent of substrate mechanics.

    • Johannes Rheinlaender
    • , Andrea Dimitracopoulos
    •  & Kristian Franze

  • News & Views |

    Mutations in lamins in skeletal muscle cells have been shown to reduce nuclear stability, increase nuclear envelope rupture, and induce DNA damage and cell death. New research shows that limiting mechanical loads can rescue myofibre function and viability.

    • Joel C. Eissenberg
    •  & Susana Gonzalo

  • Article |

    A mechanism of cell response to localized tension shows that syndecan-4 synergizes with EGFR to elicit a mechanosignalling cascade that leads to adaptive cell stiffening through PI3K/kindlin-2 mediated integrin activation.

    • Antonios Chronopoulos
    • , Stephen D. Thorpe
    •  & Armando E. del Río Hernández

  • Article |

    Lamin mutations responsible for muscular dystrophy are shown to reduce nuclear envelope stability, resulting in mechanically induced nuclear envelope rupture, DNA damage and activation of DNA damage response pathways that lead to muscle cell death. Preventing nuclear envelope damage by reducing cytoskeletal forces on the nucleus improves muscle fibre health and function.

    • Ashley J. Earle
    • , Tyler J. Kirby
    •  & Jan Lammerding

  • Article |

    Anticancer drugs such as Taxol can affect microtubule dynamics and organization in cells. Direct visualization of the action of such drugs has shown that they can trigger local and cooperative changes in microtubule lattice and induce formation of stable microtubule regions that promote rescues.

    • Ankit Rai
    • , Tianyang Liu
    •  & Anna Akhmanova

  • Comment |

    This Comment describes some of the common pitfalls encountered in deriving and validating predictive statistical models from high-dimensional data. It offers a fresh perspective on some key statistical issues, providing some guidelines to avoid pitfalls, and to help unfamiliar readers better assess the reliability and significance of their results.

    • Andrew E. Teschendorff

  • News & Views |

    Single-particle tracking of nanoparticles dispersed in the cytoplasm of living cells shows that non-specific interactions with the intracellular environment are the major contributors for the anomalous diffusion characteristics of intracellular motion.

    • Matthias Weiss

  • News & Views |

    Microbial gas vesicles have been developed for use as MRI contrast agents whose contrast can be inactivated by applying ultrasound waves to collapse the vesicles.

    • Jeff W. M. Bulte

  • News & Views |

    Single-cell force spectroscopy reveals rapid, biphasic integrin activation and reinforcement of cell–matrix bonds during the initial steps of fibroblast adhesion.

    • Ning Wang

  • News & Views |

    Blocking the growth of new blood vessels has been shown to alter fibrosis in livers in a disease stage-specific manner. In vitro models of fibrosis were developed to understand this process, highlighting the role of environmental mechanics.

    • Geoffrey C. Gurtner
    •  & Jagannath Padmanabhan

  • News & Views |

    Fragments of DNA that are derived from dead tumour cells and shed into a patient's blood have been utilized as biomarkers for the diagnosis and prognosis of liver cancer.

    • Miljana Tanić
    •  & Stephan Beck

  • News & Views |

    DNA origami nanostructures were utilized to replicate a seed pattern that resulted in the growth of populations of nanostructures. Exponential growth could be controlled by environmental conditions depending on the preferential requirements of each population.

    • Friedrich C. Simmel

  • Review Article |

    This Review discusses the materials and electronic requirements for flexible sensors and electronic systems to mimic the mechanical and sensing properties of natural skin, with the goal of providing artificial prostheses with sensing capabilities.

    • Alex Chortos
    • , Jia Liu
    •  & Zhenan Bao

Browse broader subjects

Browse narrower subjects

Browse Biological techniques across other nature.com journals