Science: Directors’ Orders

The cells of living organisms have “executive” and “operative” parts. The cytoplasm performs chemical and other duties. The nucleus in the cell’s center acts like a board of directors, telling the cytoplasm what to do.

Biologists are sure that some influence analogous to executive orders, moves from the nucleus to the obedient cytoplasm but the nature of the influence is a mystery. Last week at a Manhattan meeting of the National Academy of Sciences Professor Arthur W. Pollister of Columbia University showed electron microscope pictures of a frog’s egg cell. Magnified 24,000 diameters, the membrane of the nucleus looks solid, but poking through it are rod-shaped objects. Dr. Pollister suspects that they are chemical memos ordering the egg to develop into a tadpole rather than into a mouse or a whale.