Biopolymers in vivo

Molecular motors destroy a microtubule lattice as they walk on it, but it is now shown that a self-healing process incorporates new dimers in the damaged regions and prevents microtubule disassembly.

An approach to form protein-based hydrogels in living cells that resemble physiological hydrogel-like size-dependent molecular sieves is presented. Synthetic RNA granules mimics are obtained by functionalizing these entities with RNA-binding motifs.