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BioTechniquesVol. 43, No. 3 WebWatchOpen AccessWebWatchKevin AhernKevin AhernSearch for more papers by this authorPublished Online:16 May 2018https://doi.org/10.2144/000112545AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail Cellular Sorting SortedCellular organelles and complexes in which proteins are found span from A (axoneme) to V (vacuolar membrane), if the data in OrganelleDB is to be believed. To imply that the database housed therein is anything less than extensive, however, would not be accurate. With over 50 subcellular structures from over 130 species in its collection, the site is literally a one-stop shop for intracellular protein localization. Organized by Anuj Kumar at the University of Michigan, OrganelleDB emphasizes major model organisms in its coverage, including yeast, Arabidopsis, Drosophila, Caenorhabditis, mouse, and humans. Information is accessed via a “Quick” search engine on the opening page or an organelle-specific search system internal to the site. Spanning over 34,000 records from almost as many genes, OrganelleDB delivers data like the Energizer bunny provides power on and on…@ organelledb.Isi.umich.eduBrainy MattersPeruse the Comparative Mammalian Brain Collection and you'll probably be amazed at the anatomical similarity among mammalian brains. There are important differences, though. Compare, for example, the brain sizes of humans and our nearest relatives on the site's Paleoneurology and Brain Evolution pages. Except for a couple of vastly larger organisms (blue whales and elephants), we can feel smug that human brains are truly number one. The measure of a brain is not simply mass, but instead architecture, neural connections, and what the site calls “functional repertoires” that span almost all of vertebrate biology. Encompassing perception, locomotor abilities, instincts/reflexes, attention to environmental stimuli, learning, social interactions, and other behavioral characteristics, mammalian brains seem to have more in common than they do differences. If cranial contents constitute your interests, brainmuseum.org is a no-brainer.@ www.brainmuseum.orgArt and ScienceCells are the fundamental units of organisms, of course, so without an understanding of microbiology, one can't have a truly comprehensive perspective of life. It stands to reason, therefore, that a good microscope is an essential tool for modern biology, but what to look for in one? Ron Neumeyer, at his Microscope Forum page of the Microimaging site, addresses the question with detailed considerations of each component of a typical instrument. Not content with this or even with illustrated illumination techniques, Ron's pages also contain some of the most beautiful images of the visual micro-world to be found on the Web. Spanning the biological (protozoa, animals, and plants) and non-biological systems (sand and decorative images), Microimaging reposes the ancient question, “Does science imitate art or vice-versa?”@ microimaging.caGetting HyperAimed originally in 1994 at graduate students preparing for cumulative exams, the Organometallic HyperText Book (OHT) is a set of pages whose scope has expanded significantly in the 13 years of its existence. A labor-of-love for Rob Toreki, OHT is practically a course in organometallic chemistry all by itself. Defined as a “subset of inorganic coordination chemistry,” organometallic reactions create an interesting and diverse collection of molecules containing metal-carbon bonds. At OHT, visitors will find numerous opportunities to “learn by clicking” the chemical reactions, geometry, spectroscopy, and rules for predicting the reactivity of these interesting compounds.@ www.ilpi.com/organomet/index.htmlThe Last WordIn any listing of important molecular biology-related Web sites, Zlab is likely to get the last word, if only on an alphabetical basis. The site's organizers, who describe themselves as “a bunch of young people eager to establish careers in Bioinformatics and Biomolecular Engineering,” are, in fact, members of Dr. Zhiping Weng's lab at Boston University. With a primary purpose of providing tools useful for studying gene regulation and protein engineering, Zlab points users to powerful online resources for identifying promoters, over-represented motifs in DNA, transcription factor binding sites, protein domains, and much, much more.@ zlab.bu.edu/zlab/index.shtmlFiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Vol. 43, No. 3 Follow us on social media for the latest updates Metrics Downloaded 113 times History Published online 16 May 2018 Published in print September 2007 Information© 2007 Author(s)PDF download