www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4680914/ in Scientific Reports. I think this represents some concrete molecular progress on the question of how bacteria link growth, replication and division. This was made possible by live-cell imaging of DNA replication so that the various periods of the cell cycle could be imaged and correlations with size and growth quantified. I'm looking forward to seeing the bacterial size control field move beyond the phenomenology of the past two years and get into some molecular mechanisms as we have for budding yeast. How this completely different control system evolved to couple growth and division will form an interesting point of comparison with the eukaryotic system. Onwards!

Posted
AuthorJan Skotheim

From the Manalis and Piel labs: http://jcb.rupress.org/content/211/4/733.full

Beautiful work by Son et al and Zlotek-Zlotkiewicz et al. who developed two more precise ways of measuring volume revealed that cells take up fluid to swell in mitosis. This helps them round up, possibly to make space for a nice spindle. Evgeny and I tried to write a decent summary here

Posted
AuthorJan Skotheim

check it out in TIBS: http://www.cell.com/trends/cell-biology/abstract/S0962-8924%2815%2900193-2

Also, this review provides a bit more context than what is provided in the long form poem we wrote otherwise known as a nature letter. I hope the review helps! Also, Devon and Kurt are following this up and there is more to come on the subject (hopefully) shortly. The differential expression of genes with cell size is a bigger deal than the already big deal, IMHO, of cell size control. 

Posted
AuthorJan Skotheim