On a popular children's game participants stand as close as possible without touching. But on a microscopic level, coaxing cells to be very, very close without actually touching one another has been among the most frustrating challenges for cell biologists.

Fewer big sharks in the oceans mean that bay scallops and other shellfish may be harder to find at the market, according to an article in the March 30 issue of the journal Science, tying two unlikely links in the food web to the same fate.

Scientists have discovered how an unusual protein helps a cell bypass damage when making new DNA, thereby averting the cell's self-destruction.

Autistic children are able to interpret the mental state of others by looking at their eyes, contrary to previous research, a new University of Nottingham study has found.

Two years and more than 2,000 samples after researchers at Baylor College of Medicine started to use a new gene-chip technology called chromosomal microarray analysis to look for potential genetic abnormalities in children, they find that it is remarkably sensitive in detecting abnormalities in individual chromosomes, according to a report that appears online today in the journal Public Library of Science ONE.

New research from Columbia University Medical Center may explain why people who are able to easily and accurately recall historical dates or long-ago events, may have a harder time with word recall or remembering the day’s current events. They may have too much memory – making it harder to filter out information and increasing the time it takes for new short-term memories to be processed and stored.