Author: Erin Ross

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NIGMS Is on Instagram!

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Science is beautiful.

For several years, we’ve used this blog to highlight pictures we think are cool, scientifically relevant and visually striking. The images were created by NIGMS-funded researchers in the process of doing their research. Many come from our Life: Magnified collection, which features dozens of stunning photos of life, close-up. We’ll continue to bring you interesting images and information here on Biomedical Beat, but if you can’t get enough of them, we have a new way to share our visual content with you: Instagram.

We’re pleased to announce the launch of our NIGMS Instagram account. We’ll highlight gorgeous images, and bring you the science behind them—straight from our mobile device to yours. Instagram lets us label our images with subject-specific hashtags. You can find our pictures by going on Instagram and searching for #NIGMS. If you’re already an Instagram user, you can follow us @NIGMS_NIH. You can even see our page using a web browser at https://www.instagram.com/nigms_nih/ Exit icon. Let us know what you think!

Also, if you have any stunning images or videos that relate to scientific areas supported by NIGMS, please send them to us. They might end up on our Instagram feed!

See those finger-like projections? They are called villi. This image shows the small intestine, where most of the nutrients from the food we eat are absorbed into the bloodstream. The villi increase the organ’s surface area, making nutrient absorption more efficient. Credit: National Center for Microscopy and Imaging Research.
#science Exit icon #biology Exit icon #research Exit icon #cells Exit icon #cellbiology Exit icon #microscopy Exit icon #nigms Exit icon #scienceisbeautiful Exit icon #sciart Exit icon #nigms Exit icon #nih Exit icon #NCMIR Exit icon #UCSD Exit icon #smallbowel Exit icon  #nutrients Exit icon #nutrient Exit icon #anatomyphysiology Exit icon

We need zinc. It’s an essential nutrient for growth and development, fending off invading microbes, healing injuries, and all sorts of cellular processes. We get the mineral through our diet, but people in certain parts of the world don’t get enough. Researchers study how plants acquire and process zinc, hoping to find ways to increase the nutrient in food crops. Using synchrotron X-ray fluorescence technology, scientists created this heat map of zinc in a leaf from a plant called Arabidopsis thaliana (zinc levels from lowest to highest: blue, green, red, white). Credit: Suzana Car and Mary Lou Guerinot, Dartmouth College.
#science Exit icon #biology Exit icon #research Exit icon #botany Exit icon #plant Exit icon #arabidopsis Exit icon #zinc Exit icon #microscopy Exit icon #synchrotron Exit icon #x-ray Exit icon #modelorganism Exit icon #leaf Exit icon #heatmap Exit icon #scienceisbeautiful Exit icon #nigms Exit icon #nih Exit icon

Beautiful brain! This image shows the cerebellum, which is the brain’s locomotion control center. Every time you shoot a basketball, tie your shoe or chop an onion, your cerebellum fires into action. Found at the base of your brain, the cerebellum is a single layer of tissue with deep folds like an accordion. People with damage to this region of the brain often have difficulty with balance, coordination and fine motor skills. Credit: Tom Deerinck and Mark Ellisman, NCMIR
#science Exit icon #biology Exit icon #research Exit icon #cerebellum Exit icon #neuroscience Exit icon #neurobiology Exit icon #brain Exit icon #brains Exit icon #brainimages Exit icon #neuroanatomy Exit icon #microscopy Exit icon #scienceisbeautiful Exit icon #sciart Exit icon #nigms Exit icon #nih Exit icon #NCMIR Exit icon #UCSD Exit icon

Scientists can learn a lot by studying pigment cells, which give animals their colorful skins, eyes, hair and scales. We can even gain insight into skin cancers, like melanoma, that originate from pigment cells. Pigment cells can form all sorts of patterns, like these stripes on the fin of a pearl danio, a type of tropical minnow. Credit: David Parichy, University of Washington.
#biology Exit icon #marinebiology Exit icon #marinescience Exit icon #cell Exit icon #pigmentcell Exit icon #xanthophore Exit icon #science Exit icon #research Exit icon #cellbiology Exit icon #microscopy Exit icon #scienceisbeautiful Exit icon #scienceiscool Exit icon #zebrafish Exit icon #universityofwashington Exit icon
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Interview With a Scientist: Janet Iwasa, Molecular Animator

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The world beneath our skin is full of movement. Hemoglobin in our blood grabs oxygen and delivers it throughout the body. Molecular motors in cells chug along tiny tubes, hauling cargo with them. Biological invaders like viruses enter our bodies, hijack our cells and reproduce wildly before bursting out to infect other cells.

To make sense of the subcutaneous world, Janet Iwasa, a molecular animator at the University of Utah, creates “visual hypotheses”—detailed animations that convey the latest thinking of how biological molecules interact.

“It’s really building the animated model that brings insights,” Iwasa told Biomedical Beat in 2014. “When you’re creating an animation, you’re really grappling with a lot of issues that don’t necessarily come up by any other means. In some cases, it might raise more questions, and make people go back and do some more experiments when they realize there might be something missing.”

Iwasa has collaborated with numerous scientists to develop animations of a range of biological processes and structures Exit icon. Recently, she’s undertaken an ambitious, multi-year project to animate HIV reproduction Exit icon.

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Cool Images: An Independence Day-Inspired Collection

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In case you missed the fireworks this weekend, we’ve put together a collection of firework-like images from basic research studies.

Viral Electricity
Viral Electricity Image
This patriotic Koosh ball is an adeno-associated virus. Most people will come into contact with the virus at some point in their lives, and they’ll probably never know it. Even though it doesn’t cause disease—in fact, because it doesn’t cause disease—this virus is scientifically important. Researchers hope to harness the virus’ ability to enter cells and hijack genes and to use it to to deliver gene therapy. This image, created with the software DelPhi, shows which parts of the virus are positively charged (blue) and which parts are negatively charged (red). The charge of a molecule—like the charge of this virus—influences the way it behaves. In addition to helping researchers understand how viruses might enter cells, images like this one could help them understand how molecules interact with each other as well as drugs.
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