{"id":242034,"date":"2026-08-02T06:57:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T11:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/oil-droplets-remodel-themselves-swallow-their-surroundings-like-living-cells"},"modified":"2026-08-02T06:57:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T11:57:15","slug":"oil-droplets-remodel-themselves-swallow-their-surroundings-like-living-cells","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/oil-droplets-remodel-themselves-swallow-their-surroundings-like-living-cells","title":{"rendered":"Oil droplets remodel themselves, swallow their surroundings like living cells"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/oil-droplets-remodel-themselves-swallow-their-surroundings-like-living-cells3.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>NYU researchers have made microscopic oil droplets in water do something usually reserved for living cells: change shape in complex, controllable ways and even engulf their surroundings.<\/p>\n<p>The findings, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-026-75586-5\" target=\"_blank\">published in <i>Nature Communications<\/i><\/a>, show that some of life\u2019s signature behaviors\u2014like morphing into complex shapes and capturing material\u2014can emerge from physics and chemistry alone, without genes, proteins or active cellular machinery.<\/p>\n<p>One of life\u2019s defining features is morphogenesis\u2014the ability of cells and tissues to reshape themselves, form compartments and engulf material from their surroundings. These remarkable transformations normally rely on a sophisticated molecular toolkit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NYU researchers have made microscopic oil droplets in water do something usually reserved for living cells: change shape in complex, controllable ways and even engulf their surroundings. The findings, published in Nature Communications, show that some of life\u2019s signature behaviors\u2014like morphing into complex shapes and capturing material\u2014can emerge from physics and chemistry alone, without genes, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-chemistry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242034","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=242034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242034\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}