Only recently have scientists directly witnessed this most pivotal of events in biology, thanks to new technology that allows them to observe the process in living cells. It’s teaching them a lot.

New research suggests that the cells’ protein factories have preferences for specific messenger RNAs they translate. 

Feeding-fasting rhythms and light-dark cycles direct regular changes in organ and cell size, as well as ribosome number and protein levels.

Scientists discover transcripts from the same gene that can express both proteins and noncoding RNA.
 

Through similar mechanisms, amino acid depletion in culture and cytokine activity in the tumor microenvironment prompt cancer cells to metastasize.

The year’s most impressive achievements include methods to watch translation in cells, trace cell fates, avoid mitochondrial mutations, edit DNA, and build antibiotics from scratch.

Some ciliates use the same trio of nucleotides to code for an amino acid and to stop translation.

Four independent research groups develop techniques for visualizing peptide production in living cells.

Traditional stop codons have a double meaning in the protozoans' mRNA, sometimes calling for an amino acid during translation.