“It is highly conserved across species — believe it or not, but even fruit flies sleep.”

For decades, researchers have studied the RANK/RANKL system as a key facilitator of essential, evolutionarily conserved processes.

The pearling phenomenon is likely conserved over millions of years, Burkhardt says.

This demonstrates that the mechanism is conserved across different microbes and lifestyles,' said Professor Alga Zuccaro.

"I was excited that we could connect the structure of the nucleolus with the repair process in a way that could be conserved from yeast to humans," said Dr. Gutierrez.