It's Alive!

Coursing electricity through living tissues might sound like the work of cackling Victorian scientists, but the relationship between natural bioelectric currents and living cells is both fascinating and useful. Here, researchers use a new technique to vary the direct current across a colony of mammalian cells, watching under a microscope as they move in the direction of the electrical field. The team finds that current can act like a 'steering wheel and a gas pedal' for directing cellular migration – known as electrotaxis. Electrical changes in the body, driven by ions moving between cells, have well known roles in the nervous system and muscle contraction. But more subtle bioelectric effects, such as guiding immune cells, or helping wounds to heal may reveal themselves using these new tools, without the need for a cinematic thunderstorm.

Written by Lindsey Goff

Lindsey Goff

Editor-in-Chief

Formerly immunologist for Cancer Research UK, Lindsey has since moved into the field of scientific publishing. She looks after all BPoD editorial matters.

• Video from work by Yubin Lin & Jeremy S. Yodh and colleagues
• Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Omenn-Darling Bioengineering Institute, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
• Video originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in Science Advances, August 2026