A glossary of cellular components

Among the most intensively studiedorganisms are the bacterium Escherichia coli and the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Biologists generally expect that a better understanding of those two model organisms will translate into a better understanding of all types of life. That expectation has been reinforced in recent years by results from genome-sequencing projects. Cells from bacterial to human all seem to use the same basic parts. That’s good for physicists, who generally don’t like to memorize a lot of names. However, even E. coli has about 4000 genes, each of which codes for a protein, and S. cerevisiae has about 6000. Biologists themselves can’t name all those genes, but they do know the names of the pathways and structures in which the proteins participate. To help physicists catch up, I’ve provided a brief glossary along with diagrams of E. coli and S. cerevisiae that indicate some of the most important structures....