DNA loops and smoke rings have a lot in common
Why do DNA loops forming different knot types sediment at different speeds? Researchers from SIB, UNIL and EPFL joined forces with Polish colleagues to answer this question.
The monkeys that crossed the ocean
A study, in which Daniele Silvestro and Nicolas Salamin from SIB’s Computational Phylogenetics Group at the University of Lausanne participated, shows that the first monkeys to reach South America by sea weighed barely 400 grams.
July publications
Take a tour of SIB members' latest peer-reviewed articles and conference proceedings
"Science Fiction": Discover science in a different way
Are researchers austere? Is bioinformatics arid? Judge for yourself, with this handsome book published by SIB to mark the Institute's 20th anniversary, thanks to the financial support of many sponsors.
Life, a subtle balance
Life is a continuous balance between what needs to remain, and what must disappear. We are not aware of it but our bodies unceasingly shed cells that have received orders to die, which is a necessary process if tissues are to be renewed or to stay healthy...
Encouraging knowledge reuse to foster innovation
Being able to redistribute or reuse parts of scientific knowledge, such as information encoded in biological databases, is an essential driver of innovation. Today, UniProt adopts the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license to encourage the creation of derivative products.
Much like the khipu system, DNA knots contain precious information
Khipu – or knotted strings – were used by several Andean cultures to record information. Similarly, knots in DNA can reveal a lot about the molecule’s 3D organisation...
"Today a manager must have many skills and is expected to be everywhere at once"
As of 22 June, Christine Durinx is jointly leading SIB with Ron Appel. Christine tells us more about what such an appointment means in practice, the key ingredients needed for a successful tandem management model, and her vision for the Institute.