• On Shape

    by Manuel Sánchez — If there is some­thing that draws at­ten­tion to the study of eu­kary­otes it is the enor­mous di­ver­sity of their mor­phol­ogy, from the largest se­quoias to the small­est ra­di­o­laria. Prokary­otes, on the other hand, seem rather sim­ple and bor­ing. If you open page 109 of the 7th edi­tion of Mur­ray, Rosen­thal, and Phaller's "Med­ical Mi­cro­bi­ol­ogy" you will find...

  • E. coli Cells Face FACS and Get Back into Shape

    by Kim­berly K. Bus­iek — There's no ques­tion that vari­a­tion in size and shape has con­ferred se­lec­tive ad­van­tages over the course of evo­lu­tion­ary time. One of the most ob­vi­ous ex­am­ples are the long neck and legs of the gi­raffe, which al­low it to snatch fo­liage that is un­reach­able by ver­ti­cally chal­lenged com­peti­tors. The vari­able beak…