We use many quantitative undergraduate metrics to help select our graduate students, but which of these usefully discriminate successful from underperforming students and which should be ignored? Almost everyone has his or her own pet theory of the most pr

Protein localization plays a central role in cell biology. Although powerful tools exist to assay the spatial and temporal dynamics of proteins in living cells, our ability to control these dynamics has been much more limited. We previously used the phytoc

Optogenetic gene expression systems can control transcription with spatial and temporal detail unequaled with traditional inducible promoter systems. However, current eukaryotic light-gated transcription systems are limited by toxicity, dynamic range or sl

© 2016 Diz-Muñoz et al.For efficient polarity and migration, cells need to regulate the magnitude and spatial distribution of actin assembly. This process is coordinated by reciprocal interactions between the actin cytoskeleton and mechanical forces. Actin

© 2015 Lou et al.Cells polarize to a single front and rear to achieve rapid actin-based motility, but the mechanisms preventing the formation of multiple fronts are unclear. We developed embryonic zebrafish keratocytes as a model system for investigating e

© 2015 Wu et al.Most chemoattractants rely on activation of the heterotrimeric G-protein Gαi to regulate directional cell migration, but few links from Gαi to chemotactic effectors are known. Through affinity chromatography using primary neutrophil lysate,

Infrared fluorescent proteins (IFPs) provide an additional color to GFP and its homologs in protein labeling. Drawing on structural analysis of the dimer interface, we identified a bacteriophytochrome in the sequence database that is monomeric in truncated form and engineered it into a naturally monomeric IFP (mIFP). We demonstrate that mIFP correctly labels proteins in live cells, Drosophila and zebrafish. It should be useful in molecular, cell and developmental biology.