Max Planck Institutes and Experts

A wide variety of problems in science and technology is concerned with the study of biological and synthetic nanoparticles. Being less than one hundred nanometers in size, such objects often elude conventional techniques of detection and measurement. Nanofluidic resonators have recently enabled the direct weighing of single nanoparticles and the measurement of size distributions in complex liquid samples. Such measurements are important to help advance our understanding of many fundamental processes in biophysics, medicine, biology, biotechnolgy.

Eukaryotic pre-mRNAs contain non-coding regions (introns) which need to be removed before the mRNA can be used for the synthesis of proteins. This so-called splicing process is catalysed in the cell's nucleus by the spliceosome, a highly complex and dynamic molecular machine. It is composed of numerous protein and RNA components and it is assembled anew on each intron to be removed from an RNA transcript. Using approaches from biochemistry, molecular biology, genetics and structural biology, we study the complex catalytic work cycle of the spliceosome to understand its structure and function.

Spiral galaxies grow by swallowing smaller dwarf galaxies. As they are digested, these dwarf galaxies are severely distorted, forming structures such as surreal tendrils and stellar streams that surround their captors. Now, for the first time, a new survey has detected such tell-tale structures in galaxies more distant than our immediate galactic neighbourhood. This opens up the possibility of testing our current views of galaxy evolution in a new way.

Measurements were made of the velocities of a large number of stars in a young galactic cluster, whose age is only about one million years. The cluster is embedded in the bright emission nebula NGC 3603. It is one of the most massive objects of its kind within the Milky Way. To determine the individual stellar velocities, the astronomers compared the positions of the stars on two images taken with the Hubble Space Telescope ten years apart. From this comparison the motion of hundreds of stars could be determined, showing that the cluster stars have not yet reached a dynamically configuration.

Astronomers have so far found more than five hundred "exoplanets", i. e. planets orbiting other stars. A group of these are large planets with orbits very close to their host stars, the so-called "hot Jupiters". Their mass is similar to our Jupiter but they are often much bigger, indicating that their interior is much hotter. Left to themselves, they should cool down and deflate fairly rapidly to a size similar to the Jupiter in our solar system.