For biologists studying tiny worms, new technologies make big improvements

For decades, the tiny roundworm C. elegans has been a vital tool in the biomedical researcher’s toolkit, proving central to groundbreaking discoveries such as green fluorescent protein, the molecular marker used universally across research labs. Now, scientists in the laboratories of Shai Shaham and Eric D. Siggia at Rockefeller University are pushing the envelope even further on what C. elegans can teach us. They are developing technologies to study new aspects of how organs and nervous systems develop in these useful creatures.