Mapping the nuclear pore complex: 1.5 billion years of innovation
Wednesday, February 24, 2016 - 10:00
in Physics & Chemistry
(Phys.org)—If asked to describe the differences between humans and frogs, a child might say that one hops and rib-its while the other walks and talks. If we ask that same child how to build a frog, they will probably need a few minutes with Google. Assuming they are good, they might find that for humans you start with a diameter of 5.2nm for their nuclear pore complexes (NPCs), while for frogs the parameter you use is 10.7nm. That one detail determines a lot about what is possible in the cell, and therefore the entire organism.