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12 Dec 2019: CryoEM structures determined by the Modis group show how the innate immune sensor MDA5 recognizes viral RNA by forming filaments. ATP hydrolysis is coupled to structural changes in the filament, which are proposed to promote discrimination between

28 Apr 2019: Day 119 of #LMB365 shows blue, yellow-green, and red lasers hitting the sample stream in the MoFlo cell sorter within the Flow Cytometry facility. As cells flow through the laser beams at this interrogation point their fluorescence is measured and

23 Dec 2019: Science is all about success as well as failure and many experiments don’t work. Dealing with failure in a constructive way is a vital skill that scientists develop throughout their career. On day 357 of #LMB365, a postdoc lost his purified

27 Apr 2019: The small soil worm C. elegans is used by Mario de Bono’s group in the Cell Biology Division to study proteins that control behaviour. To extract these proteins, worms are frozen into balls by dropping them into liquid nitrogen and then ground

21 Apr 2019: Day 112 of #LMB365 shows our resident LMBeekeeper carrying out his weekly checks on our two colonies of honeybees to ensure the hives are healthy. It is hoped that LMB honey will be available for sale later in the year. To follow the progress of our

18 May 2019: Max Perutz was born on this day in 1914, in Vienna, Austria. He was the founder and first Chairman of the LMB. On day 139 of #LMB365, Max is photographed on the day he was awarded the 1962 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the studies of the structures

19 Jan 2019: Day 19 of #LMB365 shows a DNA fibre assay from KJ Patel’s group in PNAC. Antibodies are used to label DNA synthesis replication tracts (green & blue) and the rest of the DNA (pink). This is used to study dynamics of the DNA replication fork in the

28 Jan 2019: The central nervous system of a larval vinegar fly, Drosophila Melanogaster, is the subject of day 28 of #LMB365. In this image, by Alex Bates in the group of Greg Jefferis in the Neurobiology Division, the larva is expressing a green fluorescent

24 May 2019: On day 145 of #LMB365, a detailed close-up of the 1960s vertical wire model of haemoglobin. This 'working' model was made for Max Perutz and its vertical wires and graph-paper-like baseboard allowed precise coordinate measurements to be made for

4 Feb 2019: Day 36 of #LMB365 shows flow cytometry tubes waiting to be analysed. Flow cytometry is used to measure and analyse multiple physical characteristics of individual cells in suspension. This particular experiment from Julian Sale’s lab in the PNAC

3 May 2019: The LMB was delighted to welcome a team from Leeds to visit recently as they cycled around the UK on a charity microscope tour to raise £20k for International Justice Mission, a charity tackling modern slavery. This image for day 124 of #LMB365 was

3 Oct 2019: This new structure shows how the unwrapped DNA provides the major interaction interface between CCAN and the Cenp-A nucleosome. ... This new structure provides a framework for understanding decades of biochemical and genetic studies on the centromere and

14 Jul 2019: Cricket was the first recreational activity organised at the LMB. The LMB cricket team officially began playing in the interdepartmental league in 1969 under the chairmanship of Max Perutz and this year marks the team’s golden jubilee! Notable

16 Oct 2019: Day 289 of #LMB365 is an image from Costa Televantos in Lalita Ramakrishnan’s group of a granuloma from a fish infected with Mycobacterium marinum. In this image, macrophages (a type of white blood cell responsible for controlling infection) are

10 Apr 2019: On day 101 of #LMB365 a display of photographs in a meeting room charts the 10 former Heads of the Structural Studies Division: Max Perutz, John Kendrew, Hugh Huxley, Aaron Klug, Richard Henderson, Nigel Unwin, Tony Crowther, Kiyoshi Nagai, Venki

24 Apr 2019: On this day in 1953 the landmark paper proposing the structure of DNA was published in the journal Nature. ‘We wish to suggest a structure for the salt of deoxyribose nucleic acid (D.N.A.). This structure has novel features which are of

17 May 2019: The LMB is funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) via the Medical Research Council. The Chair of UKRI, Sir John Kingman, recently visited the LMB to find out more about the exciting science being carried out here. This included a visit to the

4 Apr 2019: On day 95 of LMB365 we have a picture by Katja Röper in the Cell Biology Division. This image shows the flat epithelial patch of cells in the Drosophila embryo that will form the tubes of the salivary glands over a the time span of a few hours. The

5 Sep 2019: The LMB has been running regular mentoring sessions for students and postdocs to support them in progressing their scientific careers. This photo for day 248 of #LMB365 was taken at a recent lunch held by our Deputy Director Mariann Bienz where

23 Sep 2019: This image for day 266 of #LMB365 shows a female mouse relaxing in a ‘Nombrero’. This is just one example of the environmental enrichment provided to LMB mice. The Biological Services Group provides some form of environmental enrichment to all

2 Jan 2019: As day dawns over the New Year, the LMB celebrates a year of life and work in images.

4 Mar 2019: Day 64 of #LMB365 shows a transparent nematode worm C. elegans (and eggs), with red and green fluorescence marking different tissues in the body, including neurons in the head (middle of image). The fluorescent markers indicate where signalling

26 Mar 2019: On day 86 of #LMB365, we celebrate LMB Nobel Laureate John Sulston who was born on this day in 1942. In 1969 he joined Sydney Brenner’s group at the LMB. In 2002 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries

13 Sep 2019: KDEL is the sorting signal for luminal ER proteins. In this a classic experiment for day 256 of #LMB365, lysozyme was expressed in COS cells without (left) or with (right) the addition of the sequence SEKDEL, and detected by immunofluorescence.

5 Feb 2019: On day 37 of #LMB365 we have an update on the LMB honeybee colonies. This thermal image was taken recently of one of our colonies, showing a good heat signature low down in the hive. You can even see some bees flying in and out, so it looks like

1 Jun 2019: Julian Gough uses theoretical and computational approaches to harness the power of data generated by experimental methods to advance scientific knowledge in areas including regenerative medicine and personal genomics. The transcriptome is the set of

24 Feb 2019: On day 56 of #LMB365 ultraviolet rays from a special lamp shine brightly on frozen samples sitting on a bed of dry ice. In this biochemical experiment, the ultraviolet light induces crosslinks between a protein of interest and other unknown proteins

4 Oct 2019: In the spotlight on day 277 of #LMB365 is Richard Henderson who won the 2017 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Speaking to the press in the LMB lecture theatre on the day of the announcement, accompanied by then LMB Director Hugh Pelham, it was the first of

11 Mar 2019: Day 71 of #LMB365 shows what happens when you accidentally put a denaturing gel in the freezer rather than the fridge. Denaturing gels are used to separate double stranded DNA into single stranded DNA. KJ Patel's group in the PNAC Division is

2 Oct 2019: Kiyoshi Nagai, Group Leader at the LMB and joint head of the Division of Structural Studies from 2001 to 2010, died on September 27th 2019 after a short

19 Feb 2019: Day 51 of #LMB365 shows the embryonic germ cells of the mouse. Using immunofluorescence and confocal microscopy Ross Hill (@rosshill92) visualises the developing testis of a mouse embryo where the cells that ultimately produce sperm in adult mice

23 Mar 2019: LMB Nobel Laureate John Kendrew was born on this day in Oxford in 1917. In 1946 he became Max Perutz’s first research student, and helped found the MRC Unit a year later. In 1962 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his studies of the

10 May 2019: With funding from the MRC specifically aimed at the wellbeing of its staff, a full-size outdoor table tennis table was acquired by the LMB in 2017. It is frequently in use, as seen here on day 131 of #LMB365, even in adverse weather. It promotes

3 Nov 2019: This experiment by Hugh Pelham’s group, seen here on day 307 of #LMB365, demonstrates quality control of membrane proteins. A GFP-tagged SNARE protein (yellow) that normally goes to the plasma membrane in yeast (right) is completely redirected to

17 Mar 2019: Electron cryo-microscopy (cryo-EM) is used across the LMB to determine protein structures. Part of the process for data collection involves screening grids in the electron microscope to check the grids have been produced correctly and the samples

12 Sep 2019: This image for day 255 of #LMB365 shows our Head of Scientific Computing donating the LMB’s old line printer to the Centre for Computing History (CCH) in Cambridge http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/. The printer was bought in 1991 for £8,125 and

6 Jun 2019: Between the floors of the LMB’s building are full height Interstitial Service Voids (ISVs), which house the ductwork, pipes and services. These ISVs are normally only accessible for maintenance and modifications by the Estates and Facilities team.

1 Feb 2019: The LMB has a dedicated NMR facility which is heavily involved in answering structural and biophysical questions that can't be tackled by other techniques. Day 33 of #LMB365 brings you a two-dimensional projection of an NMR experiment to assign the

6 Apr 2019: Day 97 of #LMB365 shows a precious column collection mounted on the wall of a cold room using aluminium holders designed by the LMB’s Director and made in the Technical Instrumentation Workshop. This is an essential part of the preparation of

11 Aug 2019: Day 223 of #LMB365 shows Aaron Klug beside an electron microscope at the LMB. Aaron was born #OTD in 1926. He was instrumental in revealing the structures of complex biological molecules, from viruses to tRNA, to chromatin and zinc fingers. His most

9 Feb 2019: The “Intellectual Centre of the Laboratory” is represented in this drawing by Paul Margiotta #piljammin in the LMB’s Visual Aids team for day 41 of #LMB365. Max Perutz, founder of the LMB, felt it was important that there was somewhere in the

2 Apr 2019: The LMB Craft and Chatter group pictured here for day 93 of #LMB365 meet on a monthly basis. Projects currently on the go include a knitted fox cowl, a series of crocheted wreathes and knitted baby's cardigan destined for an overseas charity. As

21 May 2019: Drosophila Melanogaster is a key model organism used across the LMB to study fundamental aspects of biology. This image for day 142 of #LMB365 shows a Drosophila head imaged by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) taken by Emmanuel Derivery in the

21 Feb 2019: Liz Miller’s lab in the Cell Biology Division uses yeast cells to study the fundamental mechanisms of transport between cellular organelles. Electron microscopy is employed to observe how organelle membranes reshape into transporters called

26 Feb 2019: Pictured for day 58 of #LMB365 are the basal stress fibres of Caco-2 cells, a model for the epithelial cells that line the human colon. These stress fibres are made of bundles of the cytoskeletal protein actin (red) as well as the motor protein

15 Mar 2019: On day 75 of #LMB365 we celebrate Daniela Peris @ddanielaperis finishing her PhD viva. During her PhD, Daniela was a member of Gonville and Caius College @caiuscollege, so she was presented with a wall plaque of the College crest. She was also a

27 Dec 2019: On day 361 of #LMB365 we have an immunofluorescence photomicrograph of blood cells in murine spleen by Ashley Kamimae-Lanning in the PNAC Division. Shown are B cells (green) and T cells (red) in germinal centres of the spleen, with cell nuclei in

22 Aug 2019: Amoebae and some cancer cells can feed by swallowing large gulps of their surrounding medium. An amoeba can drink nearly its own volume in an hour - an amazing feat if scaled to humans. This process is known as macropinocytosis, and has been studied

6 Feb 2019: On day 38 of #LMB365 we bring you the beginning of life. Early 4-8 cell mouse embryos, as seen under a light microscope, will be left to develop until they form blastocysts. Ross Hill (@rosshill92) will then derive mouse embryonic stem cell (ESC)

22 Feb 2019: The LMB has an excellent Technical Instrumentation Workshop which has expert skills in designing and building various items in different materials. Day 54 of #LMB365 is a 3D printed model of a dengue virus particle made out of polylactic acid for