Cellular & Microscopic Biology

It's kind of amazing that no two fingerprints are alike, not even for identical twins! But why is that?

By Alia Hoyt

Did viruses show up on Earth before or after living cells? A microbiologist uses the fossil record to explain.

By Kenneth Noll

The Ophiocordyceps unilateralis fungus makes a mockery of ant free will. But how does it take over the ant body to control its host?

By Jesslyn Shields

You probably use the words mold and mildew interchangeably. But these two types of fungi aren't quite the same. Is one worse?

By Patty Rasmussen

Do the sewers hold the answers to the next COVID-19 surge? And what else can testing samples of untreated wastewater tell us about the health of our communities?

By Jennifer Walker-Journey

Mold is a type of fungus, and it's everywhere — indoors, outdoors and even in the air. But is black mold worse than the rest?

By Melanie Radzicki McManus

Niels Bohr proposed the model of the atom that we still learn in school today, even though it's technically incorrect.

By Jesslyn Shields

Centrioles are spindles that create the pathways for chromosomes to follow during cell division.

By Jesslyn Shields

The part of your cells that helps you recover from a hangover is shaped like a maze of tubes and is made of two parts — the rough endoplasmic reticulum and the smooth endoplasmic reticulum.

By Jesslyn Shields

Prokaryotic cells are like single-room efficiency apartments while eukaryotic cells are like mansions with many rooms — and they are the only two kinds of cells in the world.

By Jesslyn Shields

A single-celled algae, barely visible to the eye, plankton contributes to some of the world's most important resources and is essential to the food chain that supports all life.

By Stephanie Vermillion

You could be excused for thinking that, of course, all animals breathe oxygen to live. Because it wasn't until very recently that scientists discovered the only multicellular animal that doesn't. Meet Henneguya salminicola.

By Jesslyn Shields

Influenza, Ebola and COVID-19 are all viruses. Find out what a virus does to your body and how to decrease your chance of exposure.

By Craig Freudenrich, Ph.D. & Patrick J. Kiger

Viruses need hosts to replicate and reproduce. So if a virus has no host, how long can it survive? It depends on a lot of factors.

By Carrie Whitney, Ph.D.

Chloroplasts are where some of the most miraculous chemistry on Earth goes down.

By Jesslyn Shields

Blood transfusions are required in the U.S. every two seconds. That's why the research from the Withers Lab, which converted Type A blood to universal donor blood using bacteria, is so groundbreaking.

By John Donovan

No life, except possibly very small bacteria, would exist on Earth without photosynthesis.

By Jesslyn Shields

Yep, fungi are all around us — in the grocery store, in the woods or living on your discolored toenail. And fungi can break down almost anything.

By Jesslyn Shields

When an electron loses its partner, it creates a free radical. So is that free radical now potentially hazardous to your health?

By Michelle Konstantinovsky

While plant and animal cells are strikingly similar, the main difference between them is that plant cells are able to create their own food and animal cells cannot.

By Jesslyn Shields

While researchers can't say from this small study whether hairy men are inherently germier than the rest of the human race, the results are startling.

By Michelle Konstantinovsky

This stunning sight is totally natural and totally cool.

By Tara Yarlagadda

Scientists started an experiment back in 2014 that will run for 500 years. The first results were recently published. So, what have they found so far?

By Nathan Chandler

Could these incredible new organisms provide clues about how life might exist in other areas on Earth — or even on other planets?

By John Donovan

Researchers are calling for a new "Noah's Ark" to store microbes that might one day be valuable.

By Chris Opfer