An eclipse over the cell nucleus Functional organization of the cell nucleus Prague, August 9-12, 1999

The Nuclear Family: Functional Organization of the Cell Nucleus Prague, Czech Republic, May 5–8, 2006

Driven together by entropy T he tendency of large complexes to congregate drives the organization of the genome and other cellular structures, according to Peter Cook (University of Oxford, UK). In a crowded, enclosed space (such as the cell), the aggregation of two large spheres increases the system's entropy by giving lots of little molecules more room to move around. In physics, this effect ...

Functional organization and dynamics of the cell nucleus

The eukaryotic cell nucleus enclosed within the nuclear envelope harbors organized chromatin territories and various nuclear bodies as sub-nuclear compartments. This higher-order nuclear organization provides a unique environment to regulate the genome during replication, transcription, maintenance, and other processes. In this review, we focus on the plant four-dimensional nuclear organization...

Functional architecture of the cell nucleus.

The major functions of the cell nucleus, including transcription, pre-mRNA splicing and ribosome assembly, have been studied extensively by biochemical, genetic and molecular methods. An overwhelming amount of information about their molecular mechanisms is available. In stark contrast, very little is known about how these processes are integrated into the structural framework of the cell nucle...

Dynamic organization of chromosomes in the mammalian cell nucleus

Thermodynamic pathways to genome spatial organization in the cell nucleus.

The architecture of the eukaryotic genome is characterized by a high degree of spatial organization. Chromosomes occupy preferred territories correlated to their state of activity and, yet, displace their genes to interact with remote sites in complex patterns requiring the orchestration of a huge number of DNA loci and molecular regulators. Far from random, this organization serves crucial fun...