Reverse Engineering the Fireworks of Life (VIDEO)
Caption
This time-lapse video shows the growth and branching of microtubules, dubbed the 'fireworks of life' because these microscopic structures make up the skeleton of the cell. Graduate student Akanksha Thawani and three professors -- biologist Sabine Petry, engineer Howard Stone, and biophysicist Joshua Shaevitz - succeeded in reverse-engineering the recipe for building these fireworks. Elapsed time is shown in seconds and the white scale bar shows 10 μm. (For reference, a human hair is 50 to 100 μm across.)
Credit
Akanksha Thawani, Princeton University
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