Editorial
Special issue – CellBio-X
CellBio-X: celebrating the interface
between Cell Biology and other
disciplines
W. James Nelson1, C. Rose Hosking2* and Rebecca Alvania3
1
Department of Biology, The James H. Clark Center, Bio-X Program, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA
2
Editor, Trends in Cell Biology
3
Editor, Trends in Cell Biology
Back in the past century, the Biosciences comprised a
small number of major disciplines (Biochemistry, Genetics,
Physiology, Embryology/Developmental Biology) that were
intermingled with more clinical disciplines (Immunology,
Microbiology, Pharmacology). The boundaries between
these disciplines were quite high, and maintained by the
organization of coursework for undergraduates and PhD
students, and even by the names of departments and
journals. Cell Biology was a subdiscipline often linked with
Anatomy, commensurate with the observational and de-
scriptive nature of the field.
More recently, the names of departments, journals and
teaching disciplines have changed to reflect the crossover
of different scientific approaches in the Biosciences. Sig-
nificantly, Cell Biology has become the center of many such
studies seeking to understand how cells work either indi-
vidually or together as a group – we term this collaborative
approach as Cell Biology + ‘X’, or CellBio-X. In many ways,
Cell Biology has become synonymous with ‘mechanism’ in
which the application of tools adopted from other disci-
plines has enabled a broad range of scientists with differ-
ent backgrounds to integrate protein localization,
interactions, regulation and functions with single and
multicell behaviors.
Bringing the X’s – including mathematics, biochemistry,
structural biology, chemistry, engineering and physics –
into the fray has allowed cell biologists to develop quanti-
tative models of cell behaviors; to analyze protein interac-
tions and structures in the context of cell organization and
functions; to use chemical probes to examine changes in
protein conformation, activation and inhibition; and to
analyze the effects of forces applied to, and generated
by, cells. The incorporation of these CellBio-X approaches
has also enabled developmental and evolutionary biolo-
gists to consider how individual cell organization and
behavior are integrated into whole tissue morphogenesis.
Because Cell Biology impinges on so many research areas,
it has also been used to develop new ways of thinking about
teaching and policy-making.
Corresponding author: Nelson, W.J. (wjnelson@stanford.edu)
*
Current address: Executive editor, BMC Medicine, BioMed Central.
0962-8924/$ – see front matter ß 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.tcb.2010.09.014 Trends in Cell Biology, December 2010, Vol. 20, No. 12
This special issue provides exemplars of CellBio-X, and
the ways that Cell Biology has used multidisciplinary
approaches to diverse areas of science.
The Opinions offer several personal perspectives of
how Cell Biology has become central to areas that affect
the general public. Ken Miller discusses the importance
of Cell Biology as a way to make science approachable for
the non-scientist, and as a tool to explain concepts of
evolution and developmental biology to the layperson.
Larry Goldstein discusses how cell biologists play an
important role in science policy, and offers advice to
researchers looking to become involved in this crucial
scientific arena. Finally, Janet Iwasa describes the latest
approaches to animate figures and models for Cell Biolo-
gy, and how these advances can aid in teaching and
scientific research.
The Reviews highlight several areas in which Cell
Biology has incorporated technical and conceptual
approaches from other disciplines and, thereby, given
new insights into complex biological problems. Chris Chen
and colleagues discuss the application of tools from bioen-
gineering, including microfabrication of patterned sub-
strates (to examine cell signaling, shape, adhesion and
migration), some of which can incorporate force sensors,
and methods to apply external forces to cells. Paul Sharpe
and colleagues describe how Cell Biology advances in
dental stem cell research are being translated to Medicine
to aid in tooth repair and in the generation of whole teeth.
Rob Philips and colleagues then discuss the importance of
mathematics (or numeracy, as he defines it) in the quanti-
tative analysis of an important biological problem, gene
transcription, and how a combination of experimental and
theoretical (modeling) approaches can lead to some sur-
prising conclusions. Finally, Nicole King and colleagues
discuss how Cell Biology studies of adhesion and the
development of biological concepts in more complex
paradigms are important for understanding early animal
evolution.
This special issue touches only the tip of the Cell Biology
iceberg. The interested reader is directed to any issue of
Trends in Cell Biology for further examples of the multi-
disciplinary approaches and mechanistic insights provided
by Cell Biology in many areas of the Biosciences.
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Editorial Trends in Cell Biology Vol.20 No.12

We thank the authors and referees for working to very own particular discipline to read some of these articles.
tight deadlines to compile the issue. It has been a great We believe your colleagues from other departments
pleasure for us to develop the ideas for this special will enjoy reading them too, and we welcome your feed-
issue and we hope you also enjoy stepping outside your back.

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