Biological sciences

Scientists developed a new method to unlock the secrets of RNA. The implications are wide-reaching, from better understanding diseases to designing new therapeutics. 

Peter Dahlberg has combined two complex imaging techniques into one. The 2021 Panofsky Fellow adds cryo-ET and biosensors to fluorescence microscopy to give context to high-resolution images of individual proteins in cells.

With up to a million X-ray flashes per second, 8,000 times more than its predecessor, it transforms the ability of scientists to explore atomic-scale, ultrafast phenomena that are key to a broad range of applications, from quantum materials to clean...

They aim to help society respond ten times faster with treatments for future disease outbreaks.

In our rapidly changing world, plants must adapt to new environments or die. Ritimukta Sarangi discusses how researchers and users at SSRL are tackling plant resilience from molecular to ecosystem scales.

Bringing ultrafast physics to structural biology has revealed the coordinated dance of molecules in unprecedented clarity, which could aid in the design of new light-responsive materials.

The results should further our understanding of similar reactions with vital roles in chemistry, such as the production of vitamin D in our bodies.

After decades of effort, scientists have finally seen the process by which nature creates the oxygen we breathe using SLAC’s X-ray laser.

Researchers used cryo-EM (left) to discover how a chamber in human cells (right) directs protein folding. 

His work has led to new treatments for advanced lung cancer and a better understanding of dangerous parasites.

The protein could play a key role in soil carbon cycling and soil decomposition.

Fan’s X-ray crystallography work at SLAC’s synchrotron moves us closer to a more protective coronavirus vaccine and a better understanding of how vital materials flow in and out of cells.