Scientists have discovered a new property of the molecular motors that shape our chromosomes. While six years ago they found that these so-called SMC motor proteins make long loops in our DNA, they ...

The human Y chromosome, responsible for determining male sex, finally has gotten an end-to-end examination. The Y chromosome is the smallest of the human chromosomes. “In the old time, people thought ...

Chromosomes are masters of organization. These long strings of DNA fold down into an ensemble of compact structures that keep needed parts of the genome accessible while tucking away those that aren’t ...

Chromosomes are tightly coiled structures in each of your cells that contain DNA, the code for all life. DNA is organized in segments on chromosomes called genes. Humans typically have 46 chromosomes ...

The central area of chromosomes, the centromere, contains DNA that has survived largely unchanged for hundreds of thousands of years, researchers at UC Davis and the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory have ...

Twenty years after the Human Genome Project was declared complete, the Y chromosome has been fully sequenced for the first time. Most people have 22 pairs of chromosomes plus two sex chromosomes – ...

The first theoretical model of condensin, a molecular machine involved in packing and unpacking chromosomes, accurately reproduces all known experiments with just two parameters. To scrunch a ...

The most accurate quantitative model yet for understanding the role of condensin during cell division is also visually stunning. A team of scientists from UT Austin have developed the most accurate ...

A study published in Science in the last week of February examined genomic data from three female Neanderthals who lived 1,22,000, 80,000 and 52,000 years ago respectively. The team of scientists ...