Biology

The detailed understanding of brains and multicellular bodies reached new heights this year, while the genomes of the COVID-19 virus and various organisms yielded more surprises.

When scientists discover genes linked to dangerous illnesses in their samples, how should they convey that news to the study participants? The geneticist Cristen Willer had to tackle that challenge.

Rapid advances in large-scale connectomics are beginning to spotlight the importance of individual variations in the neural circuitry. They also highlight the limitations of “wiring diagrams” alone.

No matter how much we’d like to eradicate SARS-CoV-2, it may be better to settle for other forms of control.

The spate of furious wildfires around the world during the past decade has revealed to ecologists how much biodiversity and “pyrodiversity” go hand in hand.

A mathematical model shows how a thermodynamic mechanism could have made protocells split in two.

Results from neural networks support the idea that brains are “prediction machines” — and that they work that way to conserve energy.

The brain not only helps to regulate immune responses, but also stores and retrieves “memories” of them.

A new study of gene expression in sponges reveals the complex diversity of their cells as well as some possibly ancient connections between the nervous, immune and digestive systems.