Cell Biology Befriends Soft Matter Physics

In many cartoons, eukaryotic cells have a tidy look. A taut membrane surrounds a placid, often pastel-hued lake with well-circumscribed organelles such as ribosomes and a few bits and bobs. It’s a helpful simplification of the jam-packed cytoplasm. In some areas, there’s even more intense milling about1,2,3,4. To get a sense of these milieus, head to the kitchen with Tony Hyman of the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics and Christoph Weber and Frank Jülicher of the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems…