Tag: ‘antennae’

Neurons’ ‘antennae’ are unexpectedly active in neural computation

Most neurons have many branching extensions called dendrites that receive input from thousands of other neurons. Dendrites aren’t just passive information-carriers, however. According to a new study from MIT, they appear to play a surprisingly large role in neurons’ ability to translate incoming signals into electrical activity. Neuroscientists had previously suspected that dendrites might be

Stunting cell ‘antennae’ could make cancer drugs work again

Scientists have uncovered a completely new way to make cancers sensitive to treatment—by targeting antenna-like structures on cells. Their study found that drug-resistant cancer cells have more and longer antennae than those which are killed by treatment. Blocking the growth of antennae reactivated a range of cancer treatments that had stopped working, the team at