{"id":229173,"date":"2026-01-16T09:26:45","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T15:26:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/scientists-turn-cells-most-mysterious-structures-into-spies-on-genetic-activity"},"modified":"2026-01-16T09:26:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T15:26:45","slug":"scientists-turn-cells-most-mysterious-structures-into-spies-on-genetic-activity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/01\/scientists-turn-cells-most-mysterious-structures-into-spies-on-genetic-activity","title":{"rendered":"Scientists turn cells\u2019 most mysterious structures into spies on genetic activity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/scientists-turn-cells-most-mysterious-structures-into-spies-on-genetic-activity2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The barrel-shaped structures found by the thousands in most animal cells are one of biology\u2019s biggest mysteries. But although researchers haven\u2019t figured out the function of these \u201cvaults,\u201d they now report a new use for the puzzling particles.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>Enigmatic \u2018vaults\u2019 can be engineered to eavesdrop on RNA, aiding cancer studies and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The barrel-shaped structures found by the thousands in most animal cells are one of biology\u2019s biggest mysteries. But although researchers haven\u2019t figured out the function of these \u201cvaults,\u201d they now report a new use for the puzzling particles. Enigmatic \u2018vaults\u2019 can be engineered to eavesdrop on RNA, aiding cancer studies and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1902,11,412],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-229173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bioengineering","category-biotech-medical","category-genetics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229173"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229173\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}