Using a novel imaging technique, researchers demonstrate that XMAP215, a protein known to help microtubules grow faster and longer, is necessary to nucleating microtubules. For decades, researchers have been struggling to understand why the gamma-tubulin ring complex (g-TuRC) nucleates only a few microtubules in the test tube, looking for some other factor that could activate or enhance g-TuRC. That search may now be over.